Twenty Years on the Lecture Platform 



AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



JAMES HEDLEY 



'The Most Entertaining and Inspiring Orator of his Time." 
1 a lecture by dr. hedley is one of the treats of a llfe-tlme. 1 
Minneapolis (Minn.) Tribune. 



TO WHICH IS ADDED HIS 
NATIONALLY FAMOUS LECTURE 



"The Sunny Side of Life" 

AS DELIVERED BY HIM MORE THAN ONE THOUSAND TIMES 



SOLD ONLY BY SUBSCRIPTION 



Published ty 

MARY HEDLEY, 

42 Afton Place, 

Cleveland, Ohio. 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two Copies Received 

JUN. 12 1901 

Copyright entry 

#**.. *7-'t , «" 

CLASS CL-XXc N». 

/> 5 2- 

COFY B. 



4> 



A WORD OF INSCRIPTION. 



f| T KNOW a place where love has builded; a 
igg place from which when going I weep, and to 
which returning I laugh, as with the laughter 
of angels; a place to which my children bring the first 
wild flowers of Spring; a place where affection lights 
as with the splendor of morning doorstep and window; 
a place that sorrow has hallowed and joy blest as with 
a benediction; a place where when men forsake me and 
doubt me, faith still abides and the heart still hopes. 
No painter can do it justice, no poet can sing a song 
worthy of it, and no philosopher can explain the 
meaning of its power, its uplifting, and for me its 
salvation. The place is Home, and to 

Mary, my wife 

who has made it possible, I affectionately inscribe this 

James Hedley. 



Copyright, 1901, by James Hedley. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



\A7 HENEVKR the spoken words of a man prove 
i ^ i to be of value to the world, it is his duty to 
i &*%*&* preserve them in an abiding form, that some- 
thing more than the memory of his presence and his 
speech may endure, and that others in after years may 
benefit by his thoughts and messages, his counsel and 
cheer. 

To me, the work of the preparation of this book 
has been not only a duty but a pleasure. It has been 
a joy to live over again the years of my struggle 
toward the achievement of my hopes and purposes. 
At this remote distance of time, the rough ways I have 
followed seem to have been smooth; dark days seem 
bright; every despair a hope, every disappointment a 
realization, and every sadness and rebuke a blessing. 

May I commend the lessons of my brief Autobi- 
ography to the young ? 

The lecture which appears complete in this volume, 
"The Sunny Side of Life," has been delivered 
nearly one thousand times, in all parts of America; 
more than a half million of people have listened to it 
with never failing delight and have been inspired and 
strengthened by its spirit of contentment, hope and 
faith. 

The book is submitted for the consideration of my 
friends everywhere, with the hope that it may find 
gracious acceptance, and continue an ever-present 
help, an uplift and a blessing. 

James Hedi^ey. 

cleveland, o., 

42 Afton Place, 
Month of Roses, 1901. 



PUBLISHER'S NOTE* 



W 



K ARE authorized to state that the readers of 
this book are hereby given permission to 
read or recite the poems, the sketches, or 
any extract or characterization, such as "The Texas 
Courtship," "Lillian Addlepate Tattlewit at the 
Piano," "Patsy and Mike," etc. from the body of 
the lecture for purposes of public or private entertain- 
ment, providing proper credit as to the source of the 
several selections be given, but under no consideration 
must "The Sunny Side of Life" as a whole, be read 
or delivered at any time or place without the written 
consent of the author. All rights herein are reserved, 
and any infringement of the copy-right covering this 
book will be given legal consideration. 



CONTENTS. 



AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 
Chapter I. — The Philosopher's Stone. 
Seeking for the "philosopher's stone" — Wonderful dis- 
coveries — Desire to be an actor — High School graduation — 
My mother — A clerkship — Medical student — Acting in the 
woods — ' 'The Black Crook' ' — My theatrical days — Requisites 
for a lecturer — Keep up your price — The blessing of money 
• — A speech before the foot-lights — Madame Methua-Scheller 

— A memory of John B. Gough — Shakespeare — My decision 
to abandon the theatre. Pages 7 to 21. 

Chapter II. — Tried as by Fire. 
Omaha thirty years ago — My first lecture — A financial 
failure — A book that inspired me — "Drifting about" — Epic- 
tetus, and contentment — A composite entertainment — Famous 
borrowers — An entertainment at Plattsmouth, Neb. — An 
appreciative dog — A "mid-summer night's dream" — Rich on 
ten cents — A restaurant employee — Omaha Passenger Transfer 
Co — "Hosses, korn and otes" — A Swedish husband's welcome 

— Olaf and Christine — My school— The Cardiff giant— Sol 
Smith Russell — Stranded — A rich repast — Luck and pluck — 
A dreamful sleep — Glorious garrets — "Lodgings for men" — 
Bran, the Irish Arc-angel. Pages 21 to 53. 

Chapter III. — In Friendship's Name. 
A foolish rich young man — The blessing of poverty — 
Childhood's school-day memories — Dear old Will! — A letter 

— Pawning my ring — The smoking-car passenger — Great 
friendships — Power and place of friendship — Holly and 
mistle-toe — "The movers" — "A song of the prairies" — 
"Good-bye", and off again. Pages 53 to 70. 

Chapter IV. — Starting Anew. 
"The Egyptian tooth-powder man" — Curb-stone eloquence 

— My street entertainment — Poetry and philosophy — Lowly 
beginnings of wonderful men — Moral backbone — Dollars 
versus flowers — Physiognomy — "The human face divine — 



CONTENTS. 

Allan Pinkerton and Lincoln — My discovery of James Whit- 
comb Riley — Physiognomical lectures — A tour of seven years 
— Walt Whitman and Edgar Allan Poe — Curiosities of criti- 
cism — A "Philosophian" — Lecturing for John B. Gough — 
Benjamin F. Taylor — "Motive Powers, and 'The river of 
Time' " — Martin Grover — The man who set me right — "The 
philosopher's stone". Pages 71 to 107. 

Chapter V. — The Lyceum Platform. 
Happiness — "The sunny side of life" — Working it out 
among tombs and cypress — My first and only lesson in elocu- * 
tion — Practice and earnestness — Dramatic power of great 
orators — In the market and out of the market — The first 
public delivery of the "Sunny side of life" — Queer lecture- 
rooms — Fees — Criticisms — Henry L. Slay ton — The Redpath 
Lyceum Bureau — The Southern Lyceum Bureau — The Central 
Lyceum Bureau — Great lecturers of America — My other 
lectures — My favorite lectures — Love my central thought — 
Illustrations from common life — "Before an audience" — The 
sympathy and encouragement of distinguished men — Mason 
W. Tappan — William Lawrence — A. A. Willitts — A letter 
from Robert J. Burdette — Home, and my best friend — How I 
' 'get there' ' — The lecture-platform as an institution — English 
lecturers — Charles Kingsley — "The Flag of England" — The 
orator's responsibility — Thomas Dixon and Russell H. Con- 
well — SUCCESS. Pages 108 to 158. 

THE SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE. 
Dr. Hedley's nationally famous lecture, delivered nearly 
one thousand times, in all parts of America. This lecture is 
given complete in this volume; in it will be found all the old 
favorites: "The Texas Courtship," "Apostrophe to the 
Morning-glory," "Lillian Addlepate Tattle wit at the Piano," 
"The Laughter of the Children," "Yo Semite Falls," "Patsy 
and Mike," and all the pathetic and humorous gems of this 
famous production. Pages 161 to 200. 

BEACON LIGHTS of Men and Women. Pages 201 to 239. 

NOT Very Far Away (Poem) .......... Page 240. 



TWENTY YEARS 

. . ON . . 

THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 



I. THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 

Many times during my professional career, have I 
been asked the questions, "How did you get on the 
platform?" "What is the secret of your success there?" 
"How can I get there, and how can I succeed ?" That 
these questions may be truthfully and helpfully an- 
swered, it will be necessary at the outset to repeat the 
story of "The philosopher's stone." The ancient al- 
chemists believed there was a substance, somewhere 
upon the earth, which, if found, would convert all baser 
metals into gold. This substance they called the "Phil- 
osopher's stone." According to legend, Noah sought 
to find this same stone, that he might hang it up in the 
Ark to give light to every living creature therein. His- 
tory nowhere states that Noah was successful. Many 
of the dreamers of the world have since sought it. No 
man has ever found it, but in the seeking after it, other 
things have been discovered which have brought wealth 
and fame. In searching for this treasure, Botticher 
stumbled on the invention of Dresden porcelain manu- 
facture; Roger Bacon on the composition of gunpow- 
der; Geber on the properties of acids; Van Helmont 
on the nature of gas; and Dr. Glauber on the "salts" 
which bear his name. 



8 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

The secret of my life-work is in a sense parallel to 
these experiences. The dream of my youth was to be 
an actor. That was the "philosopher's stone" I sought. 
This ambition was frowned upon by my parents and 
friends; the calling of a "player" was denounced in un- 
measured terms, as not only precarious, but unworthy, 
if not immoral. Always a lover of Shakespeare, that 
treasury of gnomic wisdom, that genius incomparable, 
that master of every matter of human concernment; a 
student of the earlier British dramatic poets, and an 
admirer of the stars of the stage, it was hard, indeed it 
seemed impossible, for me to abandon my ambition, to 
awake from my dream. During my school-days in the 
city of St. Louis, more especially at the time of my 
High School career, from 1861 to 1865, it was my cus- 
tom to expend the dimes and quarters I earned, in wit- 
nessing such plays as "The Merchant of Venice," with 
the gifted Charles Kean in the character of "Shylock"; 
"Hamlet," as interpreted by E. L. Davenport; "Ca- 
mille," by Julia Dean; a round of comedies and farces 
by that roguish elf of California, Lotta, and many 
other, to me, always delightful plays and players. In 
1865, I was graduated from the Public High School, 
and on Commencement Day carried off the oratorical 
honors of my class in an address entitled "American 
Footprints on the Sands of Time." I appeared on that 
occasion in a recital from Schiller's Wilhelm Tell, in 
the German language, and delivered a soliloquy in 
French from Moliere's comedy of "La Tartuffe." 
Honorable mention for proficiency in composition, 
rhetoric, literature, and the natural sciences was accord- 
ed me. 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 9 

The death of my mother, and the failure of my 
father in business, compelled me to abandon a college 
career for which I had hoped. My mother was a wo- 
man of rare cheerfulness, great refinement and spiritual 
fervor. Her nature was intensely religious/ Her faith 
in Heaven and God was as firm as the everlasting hills, 
and as sublime as the thought of Eternity itself. With 
the wife of these, my later years, she was my best 
friend. Through the mists of nearly forty years, I 
can still see her sweet face. She sits by my side just 
now, as I write. I feel the impress and the inspiration 
of her life. It was a life of self-denial; a beautiful 
expression of tender toiling heroic womanhood. Her 
spirit knew no complaint. She was ever grateful for 
the little given her. Her soul rejoiced when joys were . 
not, and still hoped on in spite of hard misfortune. 
Lines of care and suffering are upon her face, to me a 
face of beauty inexpressible. I have her faith, and I 
believe that my lips shall touch her's again, in the celes- 
tial country, when the frettings of this life are done. 
Had she lived, the work of my manhood might have 
been different to some extent. It was her hope that I 
might become a preacher of the gospel of the Master. 
In my work and way, I have always tried to speak for 
Him who gave Himself for us. To me, the best thing 
ever said of my public work was, "Dr. Hedley is a 
preacher whose pulpit is the platform." 

Shortly after my graduation from the High School, 
I was placed by my father in a commission house as 
shipping clerk. I remained there fifteen months, and 
must have given reasonable satisfaction to my employ- 
er, since he saw fit, soon after I entered his establish- 



IO TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

ment, to raise my wages from twenty to seventy dollars 
a month. My heart beat no time to the uncongenial 
music of that occupation, however. My spare hours 
were employed in reading the writings of the dramat- 
ists, poets, saints, and sages, and in reciting the solilo- 
quies of great actors, and the speeches of orators, more 
especially of the dramatic order. More than once my 
employer caught me "spouting" tragic lines for the en- 
tertainment of the draymen and packers who labored 
under my direction, and for this I was frequently be- 
rated. One day, in a fit of dreamy abstraction, I con- 
signed two thousand sacks of corn, which had been 
intended for Vicksburg, to New Orleans. Business 
did not fit me; I was a round peg in a square hole. I 
was discharged. Buchanan Forden, a physician and 
surgeon of St. Louis, urged me to adopt the profession 
of medicine. Having saved a little money out of mv 
salary as shipping clerk, I became a student in a small 
medical college, a humble but earnest school, which has 
since joined the silent caravans of the forgotten. Fi- 
nancial circumstances compelled me to leave the col- 
lege within a year. Dr. Forden took me into his office, 
gave me the benefit of clinics and general hospital ex- 
perience, and in two years, and when but twenty-one, I 
was in the midst of a reasonably busy practice. 

I was never happy as a physician, and in my judg- 
ment was never a great success. There always rose 
within me the old cry, "Oh, to be an actor !" Many a 
time, I used to run away from my pills and my pa- 
tients to the grand old woods which skirted the west- 
ern side of the town, and there alone, fancying myself 
a Kean or a Davenport, and the trees a listening audi- 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. II 

ence, I "acted" in a very rapture of delight. An occa- 
sional passerby would look at me with amazement, 
doubtless under the impression that I had escaped from 
some lunatic asylum. One day, I abruptly abandoned 
medicine and everything connected with it. An ad- 
vertisement appeared in the New York Clipper, a the- 
atrical journal, stating that a young man of good ad- 
dress, some education and a limited wardrobe, was 
wanted to play the parts of a "walking gentleman" in 
the Opera House at Saint Paul, Minn.; salary, twelve 
dollars per week. The golden opportunity had come. 
A local tragedian gave me an idea of what was desired 
in the way of a "limited wardrobe," and straightway I 
invested in some "tights" of various colors, a "ballet 
shirt and trunks," two "shape dresses," of red and blue 
velvet respectively, three or four wigs, a cheap modern 
suit or two, and a "make-up box" of grease paints. In 
the meantime, having communicated with the manager 
of the theater, and been accepted, I started by steamer 
up the Mississippi River for the Mecca of my dreams, 
the Opera House at Saint Paul. Being able to sing, I 
was given the part of Rudolph, a lover with songs, in 
a spectacular play, then all the rage, entitled "The 
Black Crook." This ran for a number of weeks. Fi- 
nancially, my dramatic experience in the city of one of 
the saints, was not a colossal success. Only on one 
occasion did my salary materialize in full. On salary 
day, the manager generally "managed" to be very ill 
in bed, with inflammatory rheumatism, and utterly un- 
fit to visit the box office. At such times, he frequently 
sent for me to come and see him. With tears stream- 
ing down his rubicund cheeks (he was a veritable Fal- 



12 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

staff in face and figure, and in conscience, too,) he 
would moan, "James, my boy, you don't know how I 
suffer; rub me, rub me, my boy, and God will bless 
you." His appeals touched my unsophisticated heart, 
and he obtained the rubbing, while I went away with- 
out my salary. 

I enjoyed the life, however. There was an atmos- 
phere of romance, and poetry about it ; the lights, the 
music, the scenery, the costumes, the jolly companion- 
ship, and the Bohemian trend of it all, fascinated me, 
and I was happy in spite of many hungry days, and a 
penniless pocket. This was in the summer of 1869. 
Among my acquaintances of those days, the name of 
one will never be forgotten. He was George L. Aiken, 
the first dramatist of the story of "Uncle Tom's Cab- 
in." He was my friend. How much that means! 
Many a ship would be wrecked upon the rocks in the 
river of life, but for the anchorage of friendship. It 
was Plato who said, "I would rather have one good 
friend than all the treasures and delights of Darius." 
Cicero said, "Neither water, fire, nor the air we breathe, 
is more necessary to us than friendship." George Aiken 
was my friend. A man of culture, a writer of no mean 
order, and a Christian gentleman, his place in my heart 
remains the same after more than thirty years. He was 
the "leading man" in the theater. Often, when I had 
been without a meal for a day, he fed me ; when ill, he 
provided the medicine, I myself prescribed ; we chum- 
med and communed together ; read good books togeth- 
er ; fished and swam in the lakes of Minnesota side by 
side, and in sweet unselfish ways gave our hearts to 
each other. At his request, I accompanied him to 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 13 

Omaha, Neb., in late August, 1869, and with him, be- 
came a member of the stock company of the old Acad- 
emy of Music. Many distinguished players appeared 
on the boards of that old theatre, and my experience 
was varied and valuable. 

The theatre . was conducted on the stock company 
plan. There were no travelling combinations in those 
days. An occasional "star" chanced along, and the 
resident company was expected to support him or her 
as the case might be, in a round of plays, with a change 
of program nightly. This meant hard work and plenty 
of it, for the stock member. My position in the com- 
pany was that of "first walking gentleman and general 
utility," and in that capacity almost everything was 
demanded of me. I have frequently memorized and 
acted the parts of "Horatio" in "Hamlet" ; "Cassio" in 
"Othello"; "Gratiano" in "The Merchant of Venice"; 
"Paul" in "The Angel of Midnight"; "Basil Clifton" 
in "A Child of the Sierras"; "Father Barbeaud" in 
"Fanchon"; "Noah Leroyd" in "The Long Strike"; 
"Myron" in "Ingomar"; "The Signal Man" in "Under 
the Gaslight," besides various characters in different 
farces. All this work was done within the scope of 
two weeks. Many of the parts contained from one 
thousand to three thousand words. There can he no 
over-estimating the value of this experience in the cul- 
tivation of a ready and retentive memory. I need not 
say how useful it has been to me in the preparation of 
my lectures in the years of platform work. I learned 
other things, for which no other experience could have 
afforded equal opportunity. I mastered the art of 
graceful sitting down and getting up; proper methods 



14 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of entrance and exit; poise of body, and also learned 
how necessary it is when speaking, to address the lis- 
teners who sit farthest from the stage, at the extreme 
end of the auditorium. Too many public speakers seem 
to be under the impression that if they manage to make 
themselves heard by those who occupy the first three 
or four rows of seats, they are doing all that is re- 
quired of them. An actor may impress to some extent 
without being heard; he may even be comprehended, 
but a lecturer cannot do this. The lecturer must be 
heard, and heard by all. The knowledge of elocution- 
ary and dramatic expression gained in those months at 
the Academy, has been of inestimable value. Thought 
may reach the head, but if it is to touch the heart and 
stir the emotions, it must be aflame with something of 
dramatic fire. Words must burn while thoughts breathe. 
I learned also to forget the audience; to bear it in 
mind at least only sub-consciously. The sense of a 
great gathering, with its attention centered wholly 
upon a solitary speaker, if permitted to dominate that 
speaker must be, and is, overwhelming. To permit the 
mind to dwell upon it, is for me, ruin. The glare of 
the foot-lights has a tendency to shut out the audience 
from the speaker, and with me, that is always "a con- 
summation devoutly to be wished." To this day, I ask 
for lighted foot-lights. 

Toward the close of my year in that old Omaha 
theater, a "star," by the name of Madame Methua- 
Scheller, a magnificent artist and a noble-souled wo- 
man, visited us. It was my fortune to play with her in 
a Shakespearian repertoire. She seemed much pleased 
with my work. One night, in her kindly fashion, she 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 15 

said: "Mr. Langdon," (that being my nom-de- theatre) 
"you are very conscientious ; you delight me ; you work 
very hard ; you are valuable here. What salary do you 
receive ?" "Eighteen dollars a week," I replied. "x\nd 
provide your own wardrobe ?" she continued, "Yes," I 
answered. "It is too little, my boy; it is an outrage; 
your brain is of good quality, and worth more to you 
than that." I have always remembered that. Good 
work is worth a good price. Bad work is dear at any 
price. That which we understand, is entitled to com- 
mensurate reward, and that financially. It is the know- 
ing how, that merits compensation. A man emploved 
a negro to kill a calf. He did the work well. His bill 
was five dollars. The man complained of the charge, 
saying, "Tom Washington only charges one dollar." 
"Dat may be," replied the negro, "but I do not kill like 
Tom Washington. He makes a botch; I knows how. 
I charge one dollar, de same as Tom, for de killin', and 
four dollars for knowin' how." My sympathies are 
with those who know how. As this world goes, and 
we are very much of this world while we are in it, 
money is not only a means of life, but a measure of 
success. The philosophy which affects to despise money 
does not run very deep. The penniless vagrant will tell 
you that he hates money, but I never knew one to re- 
fuse a dollar when it was offered him. We are all 
(with rare and unreasonable exceptions) sufficiently 
worldly to want all of it we can honestly obtain. The 
possession of wealth on the part of one man, is very apt 
to excite envy in the minds of those who have no 
wealth. There is much loud declamation in these times 
agai.ist the "monster" money. I have yet feo learn of a 



16 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

man with even a tolerable amount of financial means in 
his pocket who has conscientiously joined in the outcry. 
The responsibility for the widespread disaffection of 
these days, so resonant with the noise of socialistic and 
anarchistic voices, may be justly laid at the doors of 
those who in most, if not all things, have been financial 
failures. Money! It is one of the world's marks of 
merit. Rightly employed, it is an evangel of good, and 
blessings are borne upon its shining wings. I have not 
had, nor have I very much money, but what I have had 
and have, means my comfortably clothed body, my 
reasonable dinner, my books, my bits of art, a modest 
cosy home, its song and its laughter, a plot of grass, a 
few flowers, and the benediction of a happy wife's 
smiles and of the music of children's voices. I have so 
large and generous a faith in the capacity of common 
humanity, that I believe as much as this to be possible 
to every man and woman, and this faith has blossomed 
above the ashes of a time when for days I was hungry, 
and for nights slept upon a bale of cotton, with a strip 
of canvas for my coverlet. Madame Scheller was the 
first to implant in my mind a fair and righteous sense 
of my value to myself. This came to me, unsought, 
while seeking my "philosopher's stone" in the dramatic 
world. 

Shortly before the termination of my year's engage- 
ment at the Academy, I was requested by the manage- 
ment to announce (before the curtain) a benefit per- 
formance to be given in the theatre, for some orphaned 
children, whose father and mother had lost their lives 
in a serious local fire. This occurred during a second 
engagement with Madame Methua-Scheller. I did the 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 1 7 

best I could, in my way, to urge a generous patronage, 
and a liberal response on the part of the people with 
heart and purse. On my return to the dressing room, 
or rather the "green room," the general waiting apart- 
ment of the theatre, Madame Scheller seized my hand, 
and with tear-wet eyes, said, "Come with me to the 
wings of the stage a moment." I followed her. On 
reaching a retired corner, she said : "That was beau- 
tiful, so beautiful ! I heard it all. You are gifted in a 
way different from the actor. You are more the orator. 
You can do more than imitate, you can compose; you 
are a poet; you have a tender soul. You are out of 
place here. You need a wider field for your mind and 
heart than the theater can give. You should be a lec- 
turer, not an actor. You will bless men, and honor God 
most, out of the theatre. Let me beg of you to think 
of this." The voice of the call-boy broke in upon the 
conversation, "All ready for the next act !" She left me 
abruptly. Again were my feet, tramping in search of 
the "philosopher's stone," turned in another direction. 
I went to my little room in a modest hotel, at the close 
of the performance, with her words echoing and re- 
echoing in my ears. "A wider field tor my brain and 
heart !" "A lecturer !" Me ! The poor walking gen- 
tleman of a "prairie theatre," a lecturer! Was she 
right? In my heart, I hoped she was. Could I com- 
pose? Could I hope to be something more than a 
mere interpreter of the thoughts of others ? 

I sat, late into the night, pondering these questions 
over and over ; suddenly there was a knock at the door 
of my memory, and my boyhood was with me again. 
As a lad of sixteen years, I sat in the old hall of the 



1 8 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Mercantile Library, at Saint Louis, with more than two 
thousand others, listening to a marvellous dramatic or- 
ator. He was describing the power of habit; he told 
of the slaves who had enlisted under the black banner 
of intemperance, licentiousness, and the myriad hosts 
of debasing, degrading passions that cling to and de- 
stroy their victims, alluring, fascinating like the fabled 
vampire, who fans to sleep with his broad wings, and 
sucks out life itself with every breath ! He told of the 
noisy revel, the debauch, and the fierce excitement of 
drink, and of how the fettered, shrieking wretch tried 
to forget his being. Once he could pray ; once he loved 
purity ; once he drank living waters from the fountain 
of peace. Thinking of this, it maddened him. The 
memory of a mother's lullaby crooned at the twilight 
hour in his childhood, the sweet hymns she sang, rang 
in his ears, like the death-knell of a murderer. Once, 
he bore God's image, but the foul brand of intemper- 
ance was on his brow; sensuality sat upon his bloated 
lips; the dull water of disease stood stagnant in his 
eyes, and the bright image of God was marred. Once, 
purity clothed him, as with a white garment; now he 
was black with the gutter-livery of the tyrant-master 
who held him. He sold his birthright for pleasure, and 
now he is cursed with a heritage of woe. He dissolved 
his pearl of great price in the cup of hell, and drank it. 
Once his heart beat time to the celestial music of hap- 
piness ; now there is the discord of agony in his breast ; 
every melody is harsh and out of tune, and shouting 
with fearful wildness, or laughing with the glee of the 
maniac, he shrinks and shivers, and with a curse reels 
into the bottomless pit of the soul's desolation. How 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE. 19 

the words of that orator had burned into my brain ! I 
could hear them again. The speaker was with me in 
my little room ; I could see him ; he was John B. Gough ! 
As my thoughts went back to that old time, I remem- 
bered that for five consecutive nights I listened to him. 
His subjects were "Habit," "Lights and Shadows of 
London Life," "Peculiar People," "Circumstances," 
and "Temperance." His fame had reached even me, 
young as I was, and for weeks I anticipated his coming 
with an ecstasy of expectant delight. I was poor, but 
by doing odd jobs managed to earn the money needed 
to hear him. I walked five miles to and from every lec- 
ture; I heard them all. For me it was a week of 
heaven. Next to the teachings of my mother nothing 
ever took such hold on me for lasting moral good. I do 
not recall another time in my life when I seemed to be 
so inspired to do brave things, to live purely and un- 
selfishly for others, to make the years remaining to me 
chapters of beauty and courage and faith. I walked as 
in the upper air slowly home after each lecture, and 
dreamed that perhaps the time might come when I 
could do such work for mankind. In the later years of 
my life I have tried. But the lecture platform was not 
then the goal of my ambition; it was not the "philoso- 
pher's stone" I sought. No, I would be an actor. Well, 
I had been one for something less than two years, and 
an actress had turned me to the right about. Could I 
give up the stage ? How the stories of the triumphs of 
Kean and Macready and Forrest and Booth tugged at 
my heart-strings ! Could I give up Shakespeare and all 
the resplendent line of the knights of the "sock and 
buskin" in his train ? Shakespeare ! How I had loved 



20 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

him while yet a student at school ! Surely his was 3 
great heart. Let Timon and Warwick and Antonio an- 
swer for that. What question of morals did he not 
adorn ? How many problems of philosophy and of re- 
ligion had he not settled ? What calling of life had he 
not considered? As Talma, the actor, taught Napol- 
eon, so has Shakespeare taught kings the true meaning 
of state. Never a maiden half so fine in the warp of 
her feeling as he in the woof of his delicacy. Never a 
lover beneath the eye of the moon has seen so deep into 
his lassie's eyes as he into the heart of love. Where the 
Solomon half so wise as he ? Wise ! Was he wise in 
truth? In genius a colossus, but in character — "ah? 
there's the rub." His life and his genius did not trot in 
twin harness. Milton, Tennyson, Whittier, fashioned 
of the material of their souls, lives of beauty of a qual- 
ity finer than the texture of their fairest poetic dreams. 
Can we say this of Shakespeare ? What of his carous- 
als, his pipes and ale, his rude companionship? How 
much of his best thought did he mean, and this may be 
answered by asking how much of it did he live ? After 
all, is not the best of life something more than a 
"Twelfth Night," a "Winter's Tale," or a "Midsummer 
Night's Dream" ? Beautiful these are, but they are of 
the rainbow, and not of the solid earth. If I am to 
make anything of my life, I must stand not upon fiction, 
not upon tissue, but upon fact, upon granite. I must 
be what I seem. I must chip with the chisel of my pur- 
pose, be it ever so small, not at the fancies and emotions 
of men, but at their consciences. Did Madame Scheller 
feel the truth of this when she said, "You will bless 
men, and honor God most, out of the theatre" ? 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 21 

It was four o'clock, and the faint pink of an early 
May sunrise began to steal into my room, as, over- 
wearied with the night's communings, I tumbled half 
undressed into bed, to catch a little sleep before the 
work of the day, which began with a rehearsal in the 
theatre at ten o'clock. I awoke at eight, rested in body 
and with my mind as clear as the light of the beautiful 
day itself. It seemed as if a hundred voices were all 
shouting at once, "Your duty lies in paths other than 
those of the theatre. The actress is right. Your 
mother, were she here, would say, 'Amen.' " Somehow 
I said to myself, I shall make my way. In six weeks 
the season will close at the theatre and I shall leave it 
forever, and seek elsewhere "the philosopher's stone." 
On the way to the rehearsal I found myself singing in 
paraphrase a Sabbath-school song of my childhood: 

"I'll be a voice, a persuasive voice, 

And I'll travel the wide world through; 

I'll speak to the men from a heart of love, 
And I'll tell them to be true," 



II. TRIED AS BY FIRE. 

My engagement at the Academy of Music was con- 
cluded about the middle of June, 1870. I turned my 
thoughts immediately to the preparation of a lecture, 
deciding to deliver it in the city of Omaha, where I be- 
lieved my acquaintance, especially among those who 
had been the patrons of the theatre, would be likely to 
give me an audience. What should I lecture about? 
Could I say anything which would enlist the attention 



22 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of the conglomerate mixture of people which made up 
the inhabitants of the city in that early day ? All sorts 
and conditions of men were about me. Good, bad and 
indifferent; every quarter of our country, if not of the 
world, was represented in that polyglot town on the 
western bank of the Missouri river. The rough and 
ever ready phrase of the time, and one which was in 
the mouths of nearly everybody, was "boom or bust." 
Omaha was the golden Mecca of thousands. It was a 
land of opportunity, and fortunes were to be had there. 
Everybody wanted money. The methods by which it 
was to be gained were not always wise, certainly not al- 
ways moral. Men and women, too, of the "half-world"' 
were everywhere. Adventurers and adventuresses, 
were much in evidence. Faro rooms, keno shops, 
liquor saloons and dens of infamy were numerous. Re- 
turning miners from the Eldorados of the farther West 
were waylaid by shrewd commercial sharks, determined 
by hook or crook to get the gold they brought in ex- 
change for shoddy clothing and shoddier jewelry. 
There were churches, however, and good schools. 
Christian men and women labored for decency and 
righteousness, and on the whole, law and order were 
in the ascendancy. The paramount spirit of the time 
and place was practical, material. There was a large- 
ness about everything. Big ideas, and big achievements, 
were not only the dream, but the fulfillment of the hour. 
George Francis Train was there with his "Credit Fon- 
der of America." His gigantic, but half-mad schemes, 
his boldness, were popular and contagious. In spite of 
his eccentricities, he was the idol of many. He built a 
hotel of a hundred rooms in thirty days, because the 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 23 

manager of another hotel refused to board him for 
nothing, or as the irrepressible Train himself said, "Be- 
cause my conversation and my companionship were not 
considered adequate compensation for what I ate !" On 
all great occasions of public interest he was generally 
the presiding genius. When the Union Pacific Rail- 
way was finished, and the last spike, one of gold, was 
driven, George Francis Train was the commemorative 
orator. Those were wild but wide days. Opportunity, 
progress, development, fortune, were the watchwords. 
All this I knew and felt, and something of its spirit per- 
vaded my own soul. It shaped my thought, and so my 
maiden lecture was a tribute to modern opportunity and 
modern advancement, and was called "The Magnificent 
To-day." It was written out, committed to memory, 
and delivered verbatim without notes. This has always 
been my method; my best work has always been done 
in that way. Some conception of the trend of my 
thought, and of the character of my work at that time, 
when but twenty-two years of age, may be had from the 
following partial transcript of the lecture : 

"What a privilege it is to live in these times. This 
is indeed a magnificent to-day. The boy who is born in 
these days, if he lives but a dozen years, comes upon a 
richer heritage than did the boy of ten centuries, or 
even one century ago. They of the dead centuries have 
left much for us. Coming into the world rich, with the 
treasures of discovery, invention, art, commerce, me- 
chanics, science, poetry and religion all ready for us, 
we have only to make wise investments now, and the 
accumulated outcome cannot fail to bring fortune far 
beyond that of other and earlier times. This is no ex- 



24 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

aggerated estimate; no undue appreciation of the con- 
ditions with which life to-day is surrounded. Turn to 
anything you like for illustration and proof. Consider 
art, or poetry ; science or invention ; consider any phase 
you will, and the verdict will favor these days. The an- 
cient Michael Angelo lives again in Hiram Powers; 
nay, the lessons of exquisite purity and modest sweet- 
ness, the spiritual uplifting in the speaking marble of 
the Greek Slave transcend any lesson found in Angelo's 
marbles, or on old St. Peter's dome. Dante's wildly 
lighted sublimity of the Inferno reaches a higher pin- 
nacle in Milton's heaven-kissed sublimity of "Paradise 
Regained." The wisdom of Plato lives again, and in 
more comprehensible, more valuable fashion, in the 
philosophy of Spencer. All the poets of the dead cen- 
turies sing again, and in nobler strains, in' sublimer 
measure through Shakespeare. The old legends of the 
Argonauts and Norsemen, quaint, bold, heroic, speak a 
firmer message in the writings of Bret Harte, and here 
in this magic city of the wondrous West find living ex- 
emplification, day by day. (Applause.) Rabelais and 
Sterne swept with the fingers of their humor no such 
sweet and happy strings of the heart as our own Mark 
Twain. The incomprehensible and mystical chemistry 
of the ancient alchemists is made to brighten and bless, 
to profit all mankind by the masterful brain and hands 
of a Tyndall. The boasted malleable glass of the age 
of Tiberius reached its highest expression of perfection 
and beauty in the costume of spun glass, with folds as 
pliable and texture more delicate than the finest silk, 
worn by Marie Choteau at the Southern Ball in St. 
Louis in 1865. We read in many a fable of the rare 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 25 

and beautiful in art, and we wonder if ever such Alad- 
din-like gems were worn in the dead and buried cen- 
turies. Our doubting wonderment, however, is turned 
to faith, to absolute belief in these years. In the city of 
New York, at the establishment of Starr & Marcus, the 
great jewellers of that metropolis, you may see exquis- 
ite and wonderfully minute cameo cuttings upon onyx, 
sardonyx and chalcedony; in the pale, tender pink of 
sardonyx is Thorwaldsen's 'Night and Morning' ; a pair 
of cameos, intended for small sleeve buttons. Graceful 
Night floats upward, bearing in her arms sleeping, dim- 
pled, smiling cherubs, while lightly floating on trans- 
parent clouds is the lovely form of Morning, dropping 
flowers. The figures are white on a pink ground. A 
tiny black onyx is cut in cameo, three layers white, two 
shades brown, the figures being "The Wise Men" on 
horseback, three abreast, going to Christ. The horses 
are exquisitely carven in white and light brown, the 
costumes in dark brown, every detail most minutely 
and perfectly given, and just above them shines the 
"Star," with transparent halo and rays; one can almost 
imagine its glory. The microscopic charms worn in 
these days are as delicate in workmanship and far more 
beautiful than the famed ring of Michael Angelo, 
which contained the figures of seven women. In one 
with an eye-piece no bigger than the head of a pin, I 
have seen the 'Crucifixion'; thirteen figures visible in 
the scene. 

"There is, in the city of Berlin, a church capable of 
seating one thousand persons. This church is circular 
in form. The relievos, the statues, the roof, the ceiling 
and the Corinthian capital are all of water-proof paper. 



26 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Imagine a hymn sung by one thousand voices in an edi- 
fice built of old rags ! This is indeed the fulfilment of 
the second Frederick's prophecy, made in 1766, that 
'paper cathedrals would within a century spring out of 
his snuff-boxes, by some sleight-of-hand in advancing 
art.' We have no Solomon's Temple, no Roman forum, 
but we have in England a palace made almost entirelv 
of glass, covering an area of eighteen acres. Now that 
I think of it, I remember to have read something some- 
where about a Connecticut Yankee who proposed to 
build a pagoda of soap-bubbles. (Slight applause.) 
Beyond the existence of a mouldy painting of a ship, 
full of clumsy machinery, there is nothing to prove that 
the people of the buried centuries knew aught of the 
use of steam. It remained for our own Morse to utilize 
the blazing autograph of God, snatched from the storm- 
swept sky, to bind it in a thread of wire, and in electric 
whispers to talk to the wondering ones in the farthest 
corners of the world ! Demosthenes may have stirred 
the people with the fire of his oratory, but we of Amer- 
ica can boast a man of chaster speech and sweeter dic- 
tion, of greater eloquence, because of greater manhood, 
in Wendell Phillips. Save here and there an exception, 
as in the instance of Sibilla, wife of Robert of Nor- 
mandy, who, when her husband was struck with a pois- 
oned arrow, sucked the poison from his arm, dying 
that he might live, the years of the ancient past were 
unmarked by such as Elizabeth Dix, Mary Livermore 
and Florence Nightingale. True philosophy, elevated 
reason, and divine revelation, hand in hand, like angel 
sisters lead the world to-day, enlightening, reforming, 
and saving. We of America stand in the fore-front r 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 27 

marching with Time to a better Eternity." 

Somewhat crude, and in some things a little over- 
stated, and yet my heart was made glad when the "Her- 
ald" the morning after the lecture said, "The young 
man gave evidence of inherent oratoric power, and if 
he continues in this new work, patiently, persistently, 
he cannot fail of success." 

As to the material side of this initial venture as a lec- 
turer, I can only say it was a complete failure. It was 
delivered in a little dingy room called Choral Union 
Hall, and the audience numbered twenty-six listeners. 
Seven of these were "dead-heads," so that my financial 
revenue at twenty-five cents admission amounted to just 
four dollars and seventy-five cents ! The rent of the 
hall was ten dollars ; the posters, circulars and advance 
notices in the local papers cost fourteen dollars; dis- 
tribution a dollar and a half, and the postage on some 
letters written to personal friends, twelve cents. Twen- 
ty-five dollars and sixty-two cents outlay as against 
four dollars and seventy-five cents income, left a loss on 
the venture of twenty dollars and eighty-seven cents. 

At the close of the lecture I made my way back to my 
little room at the hotel by a route which led through al- 
leys and obscure side streets, not because I was dis- 
couraged, but because I had no wish to hear what I 
was satisfied would be the Job-like comfortings of my 
friends. On reaching my room I did not retire to bed, 
but took up a book recently purchased entitled "Jeems 
Pipes of Pipesville," by that versatile entertainer and 
traveller, Stephen C. Massett. The sub-title of the 
book was "Drifting About," and this expresses its 
character. It was the story of an entertainment given 



28 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

by Mr. Massett under the caption, "Jeems Pipes of 
Pipesville, a man of mirth, with story and song/' and 
described a tour of the world which he made while giv- 
ing his entertainment. The book had a peculiar fasci- 
nation for me, and I read it far into the "wee sma' 
hours." It was filled with sketches of all sorts of men 
and women, accounts of trials and triumphs, failures 
and successes, dreams and fancies, melody and legend ; 
and there was about it an air of romance that appealed 
strongly to my temperament. I remember that I en- 
joyed most Mr. Massett's account of an attempt he 
made to give his entertainment before a crowd of rough 
miners in the gold regions of California. They laughed 
at, and not with him, pelted him with ancient eggs, and 
in many ways did all they could to disconcert him, but 
through it all he kept his temper, and in the end the 
miners voted him a good fellow. His statement that 
at the close of his tour of the world he had realized a 
profit of just one shilling, stirred my risibilities to the 
utmost, and I laughed and laughed until I could laugh 
no more. Doubtless my own experiences of the even- 
ing had much to do with it. Misery loves company, 
and failure enjoys the sound of an echoing voice from 
the heart of a brother. I fell in love with Massett, and 
voted him a hero. A philosopher surely he was, be- 
cause however thick and sharp the thorns about him, he 
declined to sit on them ; he stepped round them. Had 
he journeyed for a year among thieves, his assets could 
not have been less, and yet he did not mourn, but con- 
soled himself with the reflection that the sun and moon, 
the sky and the earth, and all that in them is, were still 
his own to look on and enjoy. The grandest souls are 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 29 

seldom those who roll in luxury. Socrates lived under 
the Thirty Tyrants. Epictetus was a poor slave, and 
yet how much we owe him. ''How is it possible," he 
says, ''that a man who has nothing, who is naked, 
houseless, without a hearth, squalid, without a slave, 
without a city, can pass a life that flows easily? See, 
God has sent a man to show you that it is possible. 
Look at me, who am without a city, without possessions, 
without a slave : I sleep on the ground ; I have no wife, 
no children, no pretorium, but only the earth and heav- 
ens, and one poor clock. And what do I want ? Am I 
not without sorrow? Am I not without fear? Am I 
not free ? When did any of you see me failing in the 
object of my desire? Did I ever blame God or man? 
Did I ever accuse any man? Did any of you ever see 
me with a sorrowful countenance ? And how do I meet 
those whom you are afraid of and admire? Do I not 
treat them like slaves ? Who, when he sees me, does not 
think that he sees his king and master ?'' Here's to 
Stephen Massett! Shout, O. my soul, a loud hosanna 
to the courage, the faith, and the hope of dear old 
Epictetus ! Daylight, with eyes of gold, began to peep 
into my window, and I tumbled into bed, resolved to do 
what Jeems Pipes of Pipesville had done, and to bear 
myself, come what might, like Epictetus of old. 

I slept till aften ten o'clock, awoke refreshed, went 
out for a little breakfast, and returned to my room, and 
at once began the preparation of an entertainment 
which I called "Merydyth Krayne of Kraynesville, an 
Apostle of Happiness." I worked at this for a week or 
more. It was an olla podrida of song and story, of im- 
personations, of character, dramatic recitals, solo bar- 



30 TWENTY YKARS ON THE EECTURE PLATFORM. 

monica playing, and closed with a brief lecture on 
"Temperance." The warp and woof of the various ex- 
periences of my life entered into its tissue. The mem- 
ory of a lecture I had heard when seventeen years of 
age by Antemus Ward ; my week under the spell of the 
marvellous Gough; my life in the theatre; Massett's 
book; what of music I was master of, both vocal and in- 
strumental, and the spirit of old Epictetus all combined 
as inspirations for my entertainment. Was it a patch- 
work of borrowed shreds? Aye, verily. And yet, 
where is the pilgrim in this vale of smiles, otherwise the 
earth, who is not a borrower? Tennyson and Long- 
fellow string their lyres to old tunes, and sing the songs 
of other days. Homer and Virgil are but epitomes of 
all the men and women of our planet. Ben Franklin 
stole his thunder from another, as he stole his lightning 
from the sky. Some Ting Fung Chang of the time of 
Confucius invented an engine, before Stephenson was 
born or thought of. The ancient Romans knew the 
secret of movable types. Gunpowder was a Japanese 
plaything before men used it to kill each other. This 
is the only criminal borrowing on record. This theft 
has filled the world with tears and blood, and made 
man, the image of his Maker, of less moment than the 
dirt of the fields, since lives untold have been destroyed 
that a few men might have much dirt. The Arabians 
expounded science before Europe produced a Hum- 
boldt, a Faraday or a Tyndall. The mighty Alexander 
had a copy of the "Iliad" enclosed in a nut-shell ; some- 
body must have done the writing with the aid of a mi- 
croscope. 

There is nothing new under the sun. Nothing is 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 3 1 

original, unless it be "original sin/' Five hundred 
years ago Chaucer wrote : 

'"Out of the olde fields, as men saithe, 

Cometh all this new corn fro' year to year; 
And out of olde books in good faithe. 

Cometh all this new science that men lere." 

Reflections such as these left me no qualms of con- 
science as to the sources of my entertainment. I com- 
pleted my program, expended twenty-five dollars for 
posters and circular announcements, mailed a sufficient 
quantity to the proprietor of the hall at a place twenty- 
six miles below Omaha on the Missouri Pacific R. R.. 
called Plattsmouth, to advertise my coming, waited a 
week for the announcements to find lodgment in the 
minds of the dwellers in that little town, and on the 
morning of the fourth of July, 1870, started on my tour 
of the world. After settling my bill at the Omaha 
hotel,, and paying for my railroad ticket. I had on hand 
a cash capital of five dollars and seventy cents. On ar- 
riving at Plattsmouth. I found that the inhabitants 
thereof had gone to a place by the name of "'Weeping 
Water"' (since styled by the inimitable Robert J. Bur- 
dette, "Minne-boo-hoo") to attend a barbecue, listen to 
patriotic orations, and enjoy fireworks in the evening. 
Plattsmouth, therefore, in the matter of inhabitants that 
day, was about as full as the Sahara Desert. At eight 
o'clock I walked upon the platform of the Town Hall, 
and faced an inspiring multitude of five creatures : two 
men and one woman who had paid the admission of 
twenty-five cents, the proprietor of the hall, and his 
dog. I delivered mv entertainment. Once or twice the 



32 twenty years on the lecture plateorm. 

dog barked. At this interval of time I have no memory 
of any other applause. After paying the rent of the 
hall, settling my bill at the hotel and at the printing of- 
fice, I found myself in possession of something more 
than the shilling with which Stephen Massett finished 
his tour of the world; I was the opulent owner of thirty 
cents. 

I slept soundly all night after the entertainment, re- 
mained in Plattsmouth until five o'clock of the day of 
July fifth, and with my little hand-satchel started on my 
return trip to Omaha. Practically penniless, it was my 
purpose to walk the twenty-six miles which lay between 
that city and Plattsmouth. I started on my journey, 
and in the course of perhaps half an hour, came to the 
Platte river, which I had forgotten. It was necessary 
to cross this river. For weeks the weather had been 
hot and dry, and the stream, whose waters in color re- 
sembled that of the hair of a sun-burned yellow dog, 
only more so, was shallow, and here and there, the 
rocks were visible above the surface. I sat down upon 
a decayed log at the bank of the river, and waited for 
the shades of night to provide me with a private dress- 
ing, or rather undressing room. About nine o'clock I 
stripped, and with my clothing and satchel under my 
arms, waded the never-to-be-forgotten stream. The 
geography of the Platte river has ever remained a fixed 
thing in my memory. I know just where it winds its 
measly way along; I am familiar with its rocks and 
shallows ; its eddies and swirls ; it is to me a wondrous 
place to memory dear. It was one of the Rubicons of 
my life, and like Caesar of old, I crossed it. Not with 
banners gay, or the inspiring strains of martial music, 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 33 

but naked and alone. On reaching the opposite bank, I 
covered myself from the curious gaze of the night- 
moths and mosquitoes ; that is <to say, I dressed again. 
I walked on through tall tangled prairie grass, stumbled 
into innumerable ground-hog holes, started here and 
there a sleepy snake, or a covey of young quails, until 
two o'clock in the morning. Tired and footsore, I 
dropped into the tall grass, wet with the dews of the 
season, and surrendered myself to my first practical ex- 
perience of a "Midsummer Night's Dream." The gos- 
samer of that dream was poor, thin stuff, and the trim- 
ming thereof was the ragged fringe of hard reality. 
Neither Oberon, the king of the fairies, nor Tkania, his 
dainty and beloved queen, visited me with honeyed 
words of cheer. Peas-blossom came not, but Cobweb 
did, and Mustard-seed, in right goodly numbers. 
Moonshine leered at me, like the clown of Shakes- 
peare's fancy, and mocked my every groaning with a 
grin. Snout was there; I saw him; he came in the 
shape of a wolf; but when I shouted and flung my 
satchel at him, he fled like a miserable, unsocial coward. 

Mine was no 

"Bank wheron the wild thyme blows, 
Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ; 
Quite over-canopied with luscious wood-bine, 
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine." 

Once I thought I heard the voice of Puck crying : 
"Now the hungry lion roars; 

And the wolf behowls the moon ; 
Whilst the heavy plowman snores, 

All with weary task fore-done. 



34 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Now the wasted brands do glow, 

Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud, 
Puts the wretch that lies in woe, 

In remembrance of a shroud. 
Now it is the time of night 

That the graves all gaping wide, 
Everyone lets forth his sprite 

In the church-way paths to glide. 
And we fairies that do run 

By the triple Hecate's team, 
From the presence of the sun, 

Follow darkness like a dream." 

I fell asleep, but my rest was fitful, and I awoke be- 
fore the dawn, saying with Helena, 

"O weary night, O long and tedious night, 
Abate thy hours ; shine comforts from the East, 

That I may back to Athens (Omaha) by daylight !" 

My "Midsummer Night's Dream" came to an end 
about seven o'clock in the morning, and I was again at 
the starting point of my tour of the world. With my 
cash capital of thirty cents I walked into a restaurant 
(I think it was styled the "Bon-Ton"), and ordered a 
simple breakfast of coffee, a roll and an egg. This re- 
duced my cash capital to ten cents. I had money, that 
magical thing which crowns the fields with diadems of 
golden corn, which fishes the rarest pearls from the 
depths of the sea, and drags from the quarry's bed the 
marbles that whiten a thousand palaces. I did not have 
much, to be sure, but I had enough, because I had 
breakfasted. I should not be hungry again for hours. 
I did not stand "four-square to all the world" perhaps, 
but I was a "full man," and as I owed no man any- 



TRIED AS BY FIRE). 35 

thing, I was happy. While discussing my breakfast I 
said to the colored waiter who served me, "Do you 
know of any chance about here to get a job?" "Yes, 
sah," he replied. "De lady who runs dis place wants a 
cashier." I thanked him for the information, and after 
finishing my breakfast, walked to the rear of the res- 
taurant, and asked a pleasant faced woman, who sat at 
a desk if I might have the position of cashier in her es- 
tablishment, which I understood was vacant. She 
looked at me for a moment, and with a smile of recog- 
nition said, "Are you not Mr. Langdon, of the Acad- 
emy of Music ?" On being answered affirmatively, she 
remarked, "I always enjoyed your work at the theatre; 
if you will serve me as faithfully as you served the man- 
agement there, you may have the place at five dollars a 
week and your meals." Old adages began to flit 
through my mind : "It is better to be born lucky than 
rich;" "The darkest hour is just before the dawn." I 
served in the restaurant for three weeks, and I did my 
work well. 

One day, at the expiration of that time, while chat- 
ting with a customer, I learned that the Omaha Pas- 
senger Transfer Company needed a book-keeper. I 
called upon the superintendent and asked for the situa- 
tion. He, too, looked at me a moment, and observed, 
"You are Mr. Langdon, of the theatre, are you not?" 
"Yes," I replied. "What do you know about book- 
keeping?" "I believe I can keep your books," I an- 
swered. "Book-keeping was one of my studies at the 
High School in St. Louis ; I was called a good student." 
"Well, young man," he continued, "I need a book- 
keeper, and if you can furnish a letter of recommenda- 



36 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

tion from any well-known man, you may come and 
show us what you can do." Rapidly I ran over in my 
mind the possibilities of a recommendation from a 
"well-known man." I called to mind grand old John 
Hogan, the one-time postmaster of St. Louis, a man of 
sterling worth, and well-known throughout /the West. 
He had been my Sabbath-school teacher, and I had 
been his favorite scholar. I mentioned his name. "A 
letter from him," said the superintendent, "will be suf- 
ficient." In response to my communication, a letter 
came from Mr. Hogan, stating that I was a young man 
of excellent education, and sterling moral qualities, and 
in every way worthy of a position of trust. I remained 
with the Passenger Transfer Company for about a 
year. During that time, my salary was increased 
month by month, from forty dollars to eighty. The 
transfer business at that day was a great enterprise. No 
bridge spanned the Missouri river; passengers and 
baggage were conveyed by means of large omnibuses, 
and wagons, many of which required four and even six 
horses to move^them. Thousands of people were trans- 
ferred by this means, the conveyances making the 
journey from Council Bluffs, Iowa, to Omaha, in ferry 
boats. Those were busy days. It seemed as if all the 
world had selected Omaha as the Mecca of its hopes 
and dreams. I have seen as many as seventy passen- 
gers crowded into a single great omnibus, and fre- 
quently five and even six hundred men, women and 
children were handled without accident in one trip. 
The cost of the transfer for one passenger and one hun- 
dred pounds of baggage was seventy-five cents. 

The company also carried on what was called a 



tried as by fire. 37 

"Cross-line" between the towns of Council Bluffs and 
Omaha. The conveyances were coaches holding twelve 
passengers, and were for the accommodation of the 
local traffic between these cities. The price for this 
service was fifty cents. It was a financially profitable 
institution. The superintendent was a man of no educa- 
tion as books go; he lacked refinement in the delicate 
sense of that term; his penmanship was abominable, 
and his spelling worse; "horses," he spelled "hosses"; 
"corn" and "oats," in his letters and notes were "korn" 
and "otes" ; he would have been the ideal of the pres- 
ent-day apostles and disciples of the phonetic system. 
He was, however, a man of resource, economy and in- 
domitable energy. He made things go. It was a good 
school for me. What of business ability I possess was 
learned then. I saw much of human nature. Many a 
lesson of self-denial, hope and courage came to me. 
Instances of love and faith, and of a determination to 
win place and home, to make the most of slender oppor- 
tunity, to bear and forbear, and to do those things 
which giants are supposed to do, in the way of over- 
coming obstacle and opposition, to triumph over hard 
circumstance were every day apparent. 

My duties one day called me to the Union Depot at 
Council Bluffs. It was about five o'clock in the even- 
ing; the trains were arriving from the East, and crowds 
of pilgrims and emigrants of every nationality were 
stepping from the cars to the station platform. In the 
midst of the throng I noticed a giant of a man, a 
Swede, with a shock of yellow hair, and great ox-like 
eyes of blue; he was peering anxiously into the face 
of every woman who stepped from the trains. Sud- 



38 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

denly his mighty arms were thrown about the neck of a 
pale-faced little woman, yellow-haired and blue-eyed 
like himself. He hugged her; he kissed her over and 
over again; he lifted her in his arms, and carried her 
through the crowd, crying, "Christine! My Christine, 
come at last to me!" "Olaf," she sobbed, "Olaf ! It 
has been hard, but I have come to thee!" "Here! 
Here !" shouted the rough-voiced depot-master. "Move 
on here ! Don't block the passageway !" He wiped his 
eyes with a torn, soiled, red handkerchief; he had a 
kind heart, had that rough depot-master. Olaf and. 
Christine moved on out of sight, in the surging crowd. 
Somewhere in the great, boundless West they are set- 
tled to-day, and home and happiness are theirs in this 
magnificent land of opportunity. 

Out of such material as this has our country been 
fashioned. Without heroes such as these we could not 
be. Sitting at my desk to-day, looking out of the win- 
dow of my study, with a sweet picture before me of my 
wee lassie of the home, but four years old, a little time 
agone, dancing on the lawn, carrolling baby sonnets 
and pulling at my roses, I hope just such an one mav 
long since have come to the cottage of Olaf and Chris- 
tine. Just such an one as Olaf many a time has voiced 
his courage, his toil, his hope and his love in these 
words of a little dialect poem by Lorena Page : 

"Veil, I have ban Vest yust dree yare now, 

En ma crops ban kooming fine ; 
You see dese fields, dat little house? 

Veil dey been all been mine. 
Ay not yust now can tell you more, 

But must hurry quick away — 
To meet f adder, mudder an' Yohanna ; 

De're kooming here to-day !" 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 39 

During my year with the Transfer Company I read a 
great many books; books of history, (travel, essays, 
many of the best things in American prose and all the 
poetry I could obtain at that time. 

For me it was a post-graduate course of instruction. 
I did the best I could to educate myself. Born with in- 
tellectual faculties, I had irresistible intellectual in- 
stincts. Circumstances did not always favor the de- 
velopment of those instincts; I had much to contend 
with ; the very atmosphere of my occupation, as well as 
of the city itself was not favorable to the student 
habit. And yet, the attainment of intellectual culture is 
always not only a discipline, as Philip Gilbert Hamer- 
ton puts it, but a contest, a warfare. We may sit in a 
library of a thousand books, and every advantage may 
be ours, and this very advantage being so near at hand, 
may be a disadvantage. We do not always appreciate 
and profit by seeming advantages. Things near at 
hand are not always valued at their true worth. Men, 
if they are of good metal, love to fight that they may 
win. There is an incentive in knowing that we must 
compel the circumstances and conditions of our lives to 
yield some tribute of intellectual benefit and force. The 
school of the intellectual man is the place where he hap- 
pens to be, and his teachers are the people about him, 
the skies above him, the stones and fields beneath him, 
as well as the books he can command. This was my 
school. This has always been my school. The music 
of the beating of a human heart is more to me than the 
music of an orchestra. The page of a human face writ- 
ten over with chapters of the soul's battlings is more to 
me than the page of a printed book. And yet I read 



40 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

many books. The more I read and reflected, the more 
I became convinced that my mind would never be sat- 
isfied to remain in an atmosphere of omnibuses, horses, 
corn, oats, drivers, collectors, foremen, hostlers, trans- 
fer tickets, baggage, coupons, harness and hay ; I must 
have freer and more congenial play for my intellectual 
tastes. I grew weary of my bookkeeping and ticket-sell- 
ing, and longed to be on the road again with my enter- 
tainment. I was not happy in the full sense, because I 
did not believe that my work in the Transfer Company 
brought out what I believed to be the best in me. I 
surprised the president of the company one day in Au- 
gust, 1 87 1, by tendering my resignation as book-keeper 
and cashier. 

I had saved something over three hundred dollars, 
and began at once to make preparation for renewing 
my "tour of the world" as an entertainer and lecturer. 
I expended something over a hundred dollars for pos- 
ters, circulars and a "wood-cut" portrait of myself, 
with which to advertise my performance. lit was little 
better than a performance. I had not up to that time 
been possessed of the conviction that to succeed in the 
highest and best sense I must stand before men with a 
message; that I must be able to say something which 
would help and inspire the weak and the faint-hearted 
who falter and sometimes fall by the way. My sole 
purpose in those days was to entertain. I sought to 
give the people wit rather than wisdom. Jean Paul 
Richter has since told me that "Wit should fill up the 
chinks of life, and wisdom the great spaces." Through- 
out the months of August, September, October and No- 
vember I journeyed through the States of Iowa, Illi- 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 41 

nois and Indiana entertaining audiences with more or 
less success financially. During two weeks in Northern 
Indiana, in the month of December, the weather was 
most severe ; the mercury stood at zero, or lower much 
of the time, and night after night my audience rooms 
exhibited but a "beggarly array of empty benches." My 
slender purse grew thinner and thinner, and by the time 
I reached La Porte, Ind., was completely flat. 

On my arrival, I found Hunter's Hall, the principal 
public room of the place, at that time, occupied by a 
man who was exhibiting the Cardiff Giant, at ten cents 
admission. His patronage was small, and he was thor- 
oughly discouraged. His "Giant" was a gigantic hum- 
bug. It was a figure of a man, about nine feet in 
length, with a somewhat distorted face, massive trunk 
and limbs, and seemed to be of stone, of a dull gray 
color. The figure was prostrate, and leaned to the 
right, with one arm folded across the breast. Some 
months afterward I learned that it had been manufac- 
tured of gypsum somewhere in the neighborhood of 
Syracuse, N. Y. ; had been buried on a farm in Onon- 
daga County, and one opportune day had been "discov- 
ered" by some laborers while excavating for some pur- 
pose or other. For a time it toured the country and 
created an interest amounting in many places to excite- 
ment, and great crowds gathered to see the wonderful 
petrified man. It was a popular delusion. It made a 
fortune for its first exhibitor, and held place with the 
tulip craze of Holland, when sensible and educated peo- 
ple lost their heads, and expended vast sums of money 
for bulbs of that now rather commonplace flower. 
When the man at Hunter's Hall came into possession 



42 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of it, its day had passed. The fraud had found the 
light, and the "I told you sos" refused to patronize "the 
show." All these facts came to my notice at a later 
time. To me the "Giant" was a wonderful thing. Hav- 
ing no knowledge at that time of the fraud behind it, I 
accepted it as a fact. There had been giants in other 
days. According to Dr. Plater, the skeleton of a giant 
nineteen feet in height had been discovered at Lucerne 
in 1577. Orion, according to Pliny, was eighty feet in 
height. The monster Polypheme had been discovered 
at Trapani in Sicily, and the skeleton was said to be- 
fully three hundred feet in height. The "Cardiff Giant" 
was a very small affair compared with these older mar- 
vels, and yet it was entitled to respectful consideration, 
at least eminent scientists so decided, and the "show- 
men" who paraded it through the country were not 
slow to utilize to their financial advantage the prestige 
provided by distinguished men. 

The discouraged exhibitor of the man of gypsum at 
Laporte, on ascertaining that I was an "entertainer," 
proposed that we finish out the week by pooling issues. 
To this I gave a most ready assent, and during the 
levees of his Cardiff Majesty I furnished the visitors 
with recital, song and story. At the close of the week, 
after all bills had been settled, I was the proud posses- 
sor of seven dollars. From Laporte I went to Niles, 
Mich., a place forty miles distant by rail. The Berger 
Family and Sol Smith Russell were to appear at the 
hall on the evening of the day of my arrival. I at- 
tended the entertainment, and to this day, after nearly 
thirty years, the one bright memory of that night is the 
inimitable rendering on the part of Mr. Russell of the 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 43 

humorous character song of "Dorcas Pennyroyal." It 
was a delightful bit of art, and I knew that the artist 
would some day become famous — and has he not ? Who 
has not smiled and wept with him at his portrayals of 
"The Poor Relation/' "A Bachelor's Romance," "Edge- 
wood Folks," and other creations of his versatile gen- 
ius ? He was winning his way then, and so was I, and 
in my heart of hearts I enshrined him as a kindred 
spirit. From Niles I went to White Pigeon; there I 
found a local dramatic company had secured the hall 
for a performance of "The Chimney Corner"; they 
were in trouble ; the gentleman who was to portray the 
character of old Peter Probity was ill, and would be 
unable to appear. I volunteered to take his place, com- 
pensation for my services to be three dollars. The offer 
was accepted. Peter was a favorite character of mine, 
and I enjoyed the performance greatly. My next ob- 
jective point was Three Rivers; a fierce December 
storm began to rage, and I could do nothing but remain 
indoors at the hotel of the place for three days, which 
misfortune consumed what money I had. 

In a somewhat desperate frame of mind I wended my 
way to the Lake Shore R. R. depot, determined in some 
way to get to Kalamazoo, which I had ascertained was 
an active, prosperous town of some ten thousand peo- 
ple. A freight train came along, and I jumped aboard 
and took a seat in the passenger caboose. When the 
conductor called for my ticket I could only tell him my 
situation; he was a kind-hearted man, and said he 
would carry me as far as Schoolcraft, a distance of 
twelve miles, and there I would have to get off, as the 
rules of the company forbade him to provide transpor- 



44 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

tation to passengers free of charge. True enough. I 
thanked him, and at Schoolcraft bade him goodbye. It 
was thirteen miles to Kalamazoo, and I started to walk 
the distance. I was not very warmly clad, and my 
shoes were thin; the snow was deep and the weather 
cold. I suffered very much, and arrived at Kalamazoo 
with a severe cold. I was unfit to attempt an enter- 
tainment, and decided not to remain in the town, but to 
go on to Chicago, and there seek for a situation of some 
kind. When the passenger train drew into the station 
I went on board, and as I had neither ticket nor money, 
I turned my satchel containing my clothing, two or 
three books, and some toilet articles over to the con- 
ductor, obtained a check for it, gave him my name, and 
agreed to redeem the baggage at Chicago by paying the 
cost of my transportation, as soon as I could earn the 
necessary money. It was fully a year before that bag- 
gage was redeemed. I sat in a corner of the car, near 
the stove, hungry and dejected; a cough began to 
trouble me, and I was, all in all, a poor, miserable fel- 
low. 

On my arrival at Chicago, while passing through the 
waiting room of the depot, my eye fell upon a light 
brown paper bag, lying upon one of the seats. I picked 
it up and found it fairly well filled with sandwiches, 
gingerbread and cheese. Some opulent, over-fed tour- 
ist had evidently discarded it ; perhaps some fairy with 
a clairvoyant eye had seen me coming, and had in- 
formed him of the fact. I occupied one of the benches 
in the waiting room, and leisurely discussed the merits 
of my breakfast. Hunger and I had no argument over 
the matter ; we both agreed that it was a most excellent 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 45 

repast. Strengthened and cheered, (how much of 
courage and hope depends upon the state of the 
stomach !) I started out bravely to seek a situation. 

An entire stranger in the city of Chicago, I could not 
hope for personal assistance from any source, at least of 
a gratuitous or benevolent character. No, I must help 
myself. The old well-tried and true adage, "Heaven 
helps those who help themselves," had always been one 
of my favorite maxims, and I determined to put the 
truth of it to the test. The help of onesself is the key- 
note to the song of triumph which successful men and 
women have always joined in singing. I would be self- 
reliant, since on that rock of granite stand the palaces 
of prosperity. There should be no self-doubting, no 
timidity, for of such is the shifting treacherous sand of 
failure. As I trudged along all sorts of crows began to 
fly above my head; one black fellow croaked, "The 
world owes you a living, and you ought to have it." I 
repelled this crow with a cudgel of indignation. The 
world owes no man a living! It owes no man any- 
thing; the world does not owe; it pays like an honest 
buyer for value received. The world gives every man a 
fair, square chance to earn his bread and butter. Who- 
ever holds a note of hand or heart or brain against the 
world will have it honored at its face value, no more, no 
less. Another crow, blacker than the other, began to 
chatter, "Cheer up; wait patiently, and your luck will 
turn." I gave this crow a crack, and sent him flying 
with a scream of pain. Luck is a fraud and a liar. It 
achieves nothing ; it violates every promise. It is never 
an honest victor in the battle of life. It is a rascally 
coward and a sham. The laziness of luck is as vicious 



46 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

as its sentimentality is silly. The honors of this world 
are never won by the Wilkins Micawbers, who wait for 
things to turn up. Luck is a superstition, and clowns, 
mountebanks, idlers and thieves slouch at its heels. No ; 
I will wait lor nothing; I will act, and that this mo- 
ment. I went into a store and asked for employment. 
The proprietor looked at my old faded hat, my seedy 
coat, my broken shoes, and said, "I am not in the habit 
■of engaging tramps." I tried another store; in the 
midst of my questions I began to cough ; my cold was 
troublesome. "Young man/' said the merchant, "you 
are sick; you're place is not in a store; you need to go 
to a hospital." 

All day long I persisted in my search for employ- 
ment. I was unsuccessful. About eleven o'clock at 
night, weary, hungry, and shivering with cold, I began 
to think of a place to sleep. I determined not to ask for 
charity at any public institution. I walked on and on, 
and just as the bells were ringing the midnight hour, I 
turned into a hall-way, which opened into a great build- 
ing, somewhere on State street; I climbed the stairs, 
and made my way to the farther end of a corridor, and 
there I dropped upon the floor, and soon fell asleep. 
My sleep was fitful and dreamful. All sorts of exper- 
iences, fancies and pictures flitted through the chambers 
of my memory. I was the King in "Hamlet" ; anon, I 
was the "Ghost"; the witches in Macbeth danced about 
me; I was in the tall grass of a prairie, and wolves 
howled dismally, and again fairies sang a piping sweet 
soprano; I sold tickets, cashed checks, sang songs, ad- 
dressed multitudes, ate at banquet tables, and just as 
the gray of the morning began to creep stealthily into 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 47 

my corner I was the Cardiff Giant, and was carrying 
the world on my back. I awoke with a splitting head- 
ache, and staggered down the stairs, and out into the 
street. I went into a drug store and told a sleepy night 
clerk something of my story, and asked him if he would 
kindly give me a powder of Hydrarg sub-muriate, 3 
grains; ipecac, 5 grains, and soda bi-carbonate, 5 
grains; he opened wide the gates of his generous soul 
and gave me the medicine. I swallowed it, and went 
away happy, because I knew it would prevent a fever, 
which seemed imminent. That druggest is dead. He 
is in heaven. Such as he always go to heaven. How 
do I know ? It is written, "Inasmuch as ye have done it 
unto one of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto 
me." He is in heaven. 

I renewed my search for employment. My demands 
were spiritless; my enthusiasm had dwindled to a 
needle point; I was unsuccessful. I was beginning to 
be discouraged. The chains of despair were beginning 
to wind about my legs, my arms, my heart, my brain. I 
was a prisoner of hope. Mary Johnston has written a 
story with that title. I am told it is one of rare 
strength and fidelity to truth. A lover by the name of 
Landless rescues his sweetheart, one Patricia Verney, 
who had been stolen by some Indians, and carries her 
through a wilderness of the Blue Ridge mountains 
safely back to peace and happiness. It is all very 
idyllic. I have no doubt of it. I believe I could 
write a stronger story. To carry a maiden, sweet and 
warm, in one's arms, especially when one loves the 
maiden, is rather pleasant business. It is not very hard 
work. Plenty of us would like to try it. It is harder 



48 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

to carry the burden of one's self through the wilderness 
of hunger and cold and sickness. A story of love is one 
thing; a story of struggle for bread and life itself is 
another thing. I was not very strong physically. My 
slumber in the "hall bed-room" had not renewed my 
strength as that of eagles. Poets and philosophers 
have slept in garrets, and have enjoyed them. Sleep 
"that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care" has been with 
them a blessed guest even there. Hayden grew up in a 
garrett, and so did Chatterton. Addison and Goldsmith 
wrote in them. Faraday and DeQuincey knew them 
well and Johnson dreamed sweetly in them ; and Hans 
Christian Anderson, the fairy king, the dreamer and 
fashioner of sweet fancies, the friend of the children, 
and Collins and Franklin, and Burns and Hogarth and 
Chantrey all knew them, and learned to love every cob- 
web and broken pane, and damp wall and rat-hole in 
them. That is all true; but they never tried a "hall 
bed-room" in Chicago, just about Christmas time, with 
neither blanket or pillow. I began to be hungry again. 
I thought of Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon ; he went out 
and ate grass with the oxen, but it was winter, and 
there was no grass, and besides I was not in Babylon ; I 
was in Chicago. 

The hungrier I became the more frightened I grew. 
The Fear Fortress of ancient Saragossa loomed before 
the eyes of my imagination. That was a hypothetical 
fortress, a symbol of the terrible obstacles which fear 
conjures up, and the writer of the story tells us that the 
obstacles vanished into thin air when approached with a 
stout heart and a clear conscience. I have no doubt of 
it; but mine was not a case of heart or conscience; it 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 49 

was a case of stomach. Shakespeare should have said, 
"Not conscience, but stomach makes cowards of us all." 
Night came on apace. Untilthe last respectable door 
was locked I continued my search for a situation, but 
without avail. I took Fear by the throat, and with a 
show of courage, asked at three or four houses for a 
night's lodging; it was refused. Twelve o'clock came, 
and the streets were deserted, save by a hurrying figure 
here and there. A cutting sleet began to sweep through 
the air. Just as I turned a corner, a hand was laid 
heavily upon my shoulder. Turning quickly, I was 
face to face with a big blue-coated fellow — one of the 
city's paid sentinels upon the watch-towers of the mid- 
night — a sentinel decked with brass buttons and a 
nickel star. "What are you doing here?" asked the 
sentinel. "Nothing," I answered. "Where are you 
going?" "Nowhere." "Where do you live?" "No- 
where." "You ain't doin' nothin', and you ain't goin' 
nowhere, and you don't live nowhere; what are you 
givin' me? You're drunk; come on." "One moment, 
sir," I said, "I am not drunk; I am very, very sober." 
"You're sober ?" "Yes ; very sober ; too sober ; I am a 
stranger in the city without money, and I would like 
shelter for the night." "Oh, that's it; hard up, and 
dead broke, eh ?" Releasing his clutch upon my shoul- 
der, the sentinel said, "Go down this street till you come 
to a bridge ; cross the bridge, and when you come to the 
fifth street, turn to the right ; then go four streets, turn 
to the left, and keep on two streets more ; on the corner, 
you'll see a brown building, with a red lamp over the 
door ; go in there, and hand in this ticket, and you'll be 
taker, care of till morning." The sentinel upon the 



50 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

watch-tower turned and left me. I found the place, 
and the red lamp over the door. Upon the glass panes 
of the lamp were the words, "Lodgings for men." My 
knock was answered by a kindly-faced, white-haired 
old Irishman, who bluntly but not unpleasantly said, 
"Come in." He led the way into a bare little room 
dimly lighted by a single candle. Nailed to the wall 
was a rough board shelf, upon which lay a large open 
ledger. "Register your name," said the man. I regis- 
tered. "Are ye hungry?" Was I hungry? "Yes," I 
replied. He went out, and presently returned with a 
-tin plate, and a tin cup. The plate was piled with 
bread and corned beef; the cup was filled with water. 
The reader of these lines may never have been hungry. 
If not, I will vouchsafe the information that no concep- 
tion can be formed of my enjoyment of that supper, or 
rather breakfast, for it was after one o'clock in the 
morning. The meal ended, the old man inquired if I 
would like to go to bed. To bed ? To bed ! The mention 
of the word filled my mind with thoughts of heaven. 
The face of the old man shone as it were the face of an 
angel. Perhaps he was an angel ; for aught I knew, he 
was Michael, the Irish arc-angel. He may have been 
Bran on earth again; that pilot to the Isle of Delight. 
Listen ! sure and he's singing, as he sang three thous- 
and years ago : 

"Bran beholds a shining sea, 

From his curach fair and free; 

I, in chariot, driving there, 

See a flow'ring meadow fair; 

The sea is clear, 

So thinks Bran when sailing here, — 



TRIED AS BY FIRE. 51 

I, in car, with purer powers, 
Know the happy plain of flowers, 
Bran beholds 

Flowing billows, fold on fold, — 
O'er the plain I have in sight, 
Waving blossoms, red and white." 

"Yes," I said, "yes, I would like to go to bed." He 
conducted me into a spacious room. I saw no blossoms, 
red and white. I saw cobwebbed rafters, from which 
depended a smoky lantern, whose half smothered flame 
filled the place with a dirty twilight. Along one side of 
this room there was a raised board floor that inclined 
upwards three or four inches toward the wall, that one's 
head might lie a little higher than one's heels. Upon 
this floor, in a row, lay a lot of filthy, steaming, reeking 
wretches, some sixty or more, ragged, haggard, bloated, 
ghastly. Some were in a heavy drunken sleep. Some 
were groaning with agony of body, and some with 
agony of soul. Some were cursing luck and life and 
God. Here, a man with the white of death upon him, 
there another with tear-wet cheeks, and yonder still an- 
other gasping for breath. How could he breathe at all ? 
The stench of the Augean stables must have been 
sweeter than the odor of that room. In all the Stygian 
blackness of that inferno there was but one ray of light 
In a corner, fast in the vice-like grip of a glaring tiger 
of a man, lay a dimpled boy, with a sweet face — a face 
set like a picture in a frame of golden clustering curls. 
There was a smile upon his rose-bud mouth, pencilled 
by the hand of some beautiful memory, the memory 
perchance of a time when at happy, childish play he had 
romped in green fields and tangled his feet in the mesh 



52 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of the clover. Sin and sorrow and festering pollution 
were the Hecates of that hell-brewed caldron. "You 
may lie down there and sleep," said the old man. 
"Sleep ! sleep there !" I said with a sob that choked me. 
"I cannot sleep there, I thank you, sir, but if you will 
permit me I will sit up with you till morning." "It's 
against the rules," he replied, "but ye don't look much 
like the rest o' thim ; mebbe ye couldn't stand it ; ye may 
sit up if ye like, but don't say anything about it on the 
outside." I went back with him to the entrance apart- 
ment of the place, and we talked the night away. 
"What brings ye here ?" he questioned during our con- 
versation. "Circumstances," I replied, "poverty and 
failure." "What brings these men here," I asked, 
"hard times?" "Oh, no; nothing like that; idleness 
and drunkenness brings the most o' them here; if it 
wasn't for drunkenness there wouldn't be a half dozen 
o' thim here." I had been neither an idler, nor a drunk- 
ard, and yet I passed the night there. Sometimes this 
thing we call life is a veritable riddle of the Sphynx; 
there is no solving it. The brief hours until the morn- 
ing passed all too quickly. I was happy with old Bran. 
His heart was as kindly as the Erin he came from was 
green. He told me tales of his own poor youth before 
he came to America. He made me forget myself more 
than once with his wit and his wisdom. He entertained 
me with one or two fairy fancies, and with a bit of a 
lilt about "a feather in a tom-cat's tail," the burden of 
an Irish lullaby his mother used to sing. I might have 
been a king in a castle and he my harper-minstrel. Be- 
fore bidding him "Good-bye" in the morning he gave 
me a breakfast; this time, with the bread and corned 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 53 

beef, I shared his can of coffee. He would have it so. 
"God bless you/' were his parting words, "some day I 
hope to see you again, but not here." "Amen," I re- 
sponded, as I shook his hand again and again. I left 
him, and forever. I have never seen him since. Per- 
haps it is because I have never revisited his hospitable 
"Lodgings for men." 



III. in friendship's name. 

The morning after my night with my Irish friend 
was a most beautiful one. The storm had abated; the 
cold had moderated; the sky was clear, and the sun- 
shine flung its mantle of gold upon everything about 
me. Though cold, beyond the point of comfort to one 
lightly clad, the air was sweet and invigorating, and, 
despite my worn and weak condition, I felt something 
of the inspiration and joy of the day. I wended my 
way toward the handsome residence portion of the city, 
and walked for two or three hours along splendid ave- 
nues filled with the homes of the rich and prosperous. 
I was beginning to feel something of envy, when my 
thoughts were given a sudden and happier turn by the 
sight of a fashionably dressed young man, with a 
flushed face, and unsteady step, who stumbled upon the 
pavement, and fell full length in the snow. I helped 
him to rise; he looked at me, leered, and finally said: 
"Shay, what's number of this (hie) house?" signifying 
the one before which we were standing. I gave him 
the number. He laughed boisterously, and said : "Tha's 
all right; tha's where I live." He staggered up the 



54 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

wide stairs leading to the front door, and after consid- 
erable fumbling, managed to effect an entrance into the 
dwelling which was of imposing architecture. Strange, 
but that episode made me feel better. There are worse 
things than poverty, and that young man evidently had 
more money than was good for him. My envy van- 
ished. I would not have changed places with that heir 
of the mansion on the avenue, born doubtless with a 
golden spoon in his mouth. He had slipped into this 
world at the big end of the horn, and he was in a fair, 
or rather foul way, to sneak out at the little end. There 
would be no help for him, unless he should grow wise, 
and, before it was too late, back out as he came in — 
with nothing. After all, who can say it is not a good 
thing to be poor, and a blessed thing to suffer? The 
chances for the best in character at least, are with such. 
The world has not in its lists of honor the names of 
many truly good, great, and beautiful, who have not 
been burned in the fires of bitterness, and tested in the 
crucibles of suffering. There is no truer thought than 
the Bible thought, "Whom God loveth, He chasteneth," 
and again, "A bruised reed He will not break." How 
we need the sweet and earnest faith of the old colored 
woman, who said : "Honey, my sufferin's ain't nuffin. 
Don't you know we is jest in de hands of de Lord. 
Sometimes He whips us, and sometimes He leaves us, 
jest to see ef we won't trust Him an' try again. Bless 
yer heart, honey, jess as soon as we cries like a little 
tired baby, He takes us up an' comforts us!" How 
finely tempered are the souls which have been tried as 
by fire. Not up 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 55 

"On the heights, where those shine, 
But down in the pits where these shiver, 
Is the essence of life most divine." 

From time to time, during my "tour of the world," 
it had been my habit and my pleasure to correspond 
with a boyhood friend, a class-mate of my school days. 
From the earlier years of childhood, when in a modest 
suburban school-house, we sang together, 

"Five times five are twenty-five, 
And five times six are thirty; 

Five times seven are thirty-five, 
And five times eight are forty," 

and when, with mingled generosity and mischief, we 
provided red apples for the teacher, spruce gum for the 
girls, and bent pins for the boys, until the day of our 
graduation, we had been boon companions. He had 
launched the boat of his life into the stream of busi- 
ness, and at the age of twenty-three was being pros- 
pered as the financial side of this world goes. He was 
the son of a cultivated, prominent and wealthy man ? 
and connected with the leading families of St. Louis, 
thirty years ago. Disappointment and misfortune have 
overtaken him, and he is now a prematurely old and 
broken man. There are some things we may not write 
• in books. The aftermath is not always what 'the glean- 
ers would wish for. His name — to me, he has always 
been Will. Impulsive and kind-hearted, with a heart 
bigger than thy head, would I were able in these later 
years, to place in thy hand a laurel, and on thy head a 
crown. Dear old friend of my boyhood days ! 

Some opportune fairy of fate, whispered his name to 



56 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

me, as I walked the streets that December morning. 
Was it fate? Nay, it was Providence. With the 
thought of him in my heart of hearts, I almost ran to 
the postoffice. On reaching it, I inquired at the general 
delivery window for a letter. One was handed me; it 
was from Will. It expressed generous regret at my 
ill success with my entertainment, and urged me to rest 
awhile, and come and spend the remainder of the win- 
ter with him, at his father's home. "Be sure and get 
here," were the closing lines, "in time for Christmas." 
Dear old Will. In time for Christmas ! It was already 
the twenty-third of December. How I longed to ac- 
cept the invitation ! I must accept it. I saw no other 
open door of escape from the burdens that were weigh- 
ing me down. But how could I get to St. Louis ? Three 
hundred miles lay between me and the home of my 
friend; between a veritable Calvary and the cheer of 
Christmas. I was penniless. Oh, for the touch of 
Midas for just one second ! I rubbed a tear from my 
cheek with my hand, and felt something hard and cold. 
I looked at my hand, and wanted to shout "Hallelu- 
jah!" The something hard and cold was a gold ring, 
set with what were called in the West in early days, 
Eldorado diamonds. The ring was an odd thing, and 
had been given me by a returned miner from Idaho, 
while I had served as bookkeeeper for the Omaha 
Transfer Company. It was the only bit of jewelry 
remaining to me ; other trinkets had been swallowed up 
in the settlement of debts growing out of the obliga- 
tions of my entertainment. Sentiment had impelled 
me not to part with the miner's gift. Sentiment is a 
lovely thing; as lovely to think on as the rainbow is to 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 57 

look on, but neither the one nor the other can provide 
warmth when we are cold, or feed us when we are 
hungry. Both are very beautiful, but when weighed 
in the balance with friendship, both kick the beam. 
The voice of my friend was calling me, and putting 
my heel upon the rainbow of sentiment, I walked into a 
pawnshop, and transferred the ring from my finger to 
the show-window of "mine uncle," for eight dollars. 
An evening train over the Illinois Central R. R. had a 
passenger for St. Louis, in the smoking-car, with a 
second-class ticket in his pocket. I was the passenger. 
I did not sleep much during that night ride, but the 
way did not seem long; my thoughts were busy with 
reflections of past experiences ; I had worked hard, and 
yet the end which I sought seemed as far away as when 
the actress had turned me to the right about two years 
before. I shed no tears, however, because I believed 
that some time the realization of all my hopes would be 
mine. I was happy in the thought that in a few hours, 
I should see my friend. My friend! How much of 
the best of earthly achievement and joy is due to 
friendship. Even the mighty Alexander found his 
highest good through the almost sacred friendship of 
Hephestion. But for him, the treasures of Hellenic 
civilization would never have become the common pos- 
session of the world. The friendship of Alcuin, an 
English Christian scholar, influenced Charlemagne to 
give to learning and religion a place in the government 
of mankind, as against the blind force of military des- 
potism. But for the unselfish friendship of Abou 
Baker, religious thought would have had no Moham- 
med, and but for that of Hadrian, there could have 



5S TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

been no Theodore of Tarsus, and the administrative 
system of the English Church would never have been 
organized. But for the friendship of Erasmus, the 
greatest teacher of his time, the Protestant Reforma- 
tion would have been without a Martin Luther. The 
friendship of Margaret Fell for George Fox enabled 
him to found and perpetuate the Society of Friends,, 
that sweet brotherhood of toleration and simplicity. 
May we not say that Methodism might not have been 
but for the friendship which made John and Charles 
Wesley more than brothers, and drew about them as 
kindred spirits such names as Morgan and Kirkham, 
Ingham and Hervey and Whitefield? Wherever civil 
liberty has obtained, triumphed and endured, there 
some mighty friendship has been the impelling force, 
from the time of the Athenian Harmodius to that of 
the central characters in the establishment of our coun- 
try — Hamilton and Washington. Does humanity owe 
a debt of gratitude to the disseminators of philosophic 
thought? If so, it must be equally grateful to the 
friendships which made that dissemination possible; 
the friendships of Socrates and Plato, of Philip of 
Macedon and Aristotle, of the Earl of Essex and Ba- 
con, of Charlotte of Prussia and Leibnitz, who after 
Aristotle has no equal (save perhaps in the single in- 
stance of Humboldt) in his grasp of universal knowl- 
edge. Without the outgoing and uplifting force of 
friendship, the sweetest strings of the poet's lute would 
still remain unswept, nor could the human heart beat 
time responsive to the best of the music of life and love. 
Give a man one friend who understands him, who 
will not leave nor forsake him, who will be accessible 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 59* 

by day and by night to him, just one, and all the uni- 
verse is changed from darkness into light. Will, to* 
me, seemed such a friend, and I was going to him. 
So the way did not seem long. Early on the morning 
of December 24th, 1872, I arrived at the then dingy 
and dirty Union Station of St. Louis. I peered 
inquiringly into the faces of the crowd which gathered 
about the incoming train, and soon saw the face of my 
friend, with eyes of kindly blue, and framed in curling 
hair of gold. He was a handsome youth in those old 
days. He did not see my faded hat, my seedy coat and 
frayed pantaloons ; he saw only me, and putting his. 
arm about my neck, he seized my hand and said "Jim !" 
After a few words of loving greeting, he said ever sa 
gently, "I need a bath and a shave; usually, I do my 
bathing at home, but I can save a little time by attend- 
ing to it down town; I know a good place; suppose 
we both go and try it." Dear old Will ! In such unob- 
trusive fashion, he administered to me, a dose of that 
"cleanliness which is next to godliness." We break- 
fasted together, and he insisted upon paying the score. 
From his manner, I was left to believe that he thought 
me abundantly able to settle, but that he would con- 
sider it a favor if I would but permit him to do it.. 
Dear old Will! I went with him to the offices of a. 
great Insurance Company, for which he acted as 
Secretary. I was welcomed by all present, and was 
given the journals of the day to read. Early in the 
afternoon, we went to a delightful house in the suburbs 
of the city — the home of my friend. The impress of 
the spirit of the Christmas time was upon everything. 
Wreaths of holly hung in the windows, and sprays of 



6o TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

mistle-toe decked the curtains and pictures. The gray 
father of the house, and its every inmate bade me 
kindly welcome, and "Peace and Good- will, " the hope 
and benediction of the Master were over all. I shall 
never forget the joy of Christmas morning. Gifts 
were bestowed with royal bounty upon all; mine was 
a suit of clothing, the offering of a dear old maiden 
lady, an aunt of my friend who made her home with 
the family. I remained in that hospitable house until 
April of the year of 1873. I grew well and strong 
under the comfort and cheer of its unfailing offices of 
generosity. I had much leisure for reading and study, 
and passed many delightful days in the library, which 
was well filled with excellent books. I wrought out 
upon the canvas of my poetic fancy some pictures of 
past experiences, and was fortunate enough to have 
them accepted for publication by the "Republican," 
the leading local newspaper. I may be pardoned if I 
here give two or three bits of my rhyme, which saw the 
light at that early day. Once, out in western Nebraska, 
I had seen a wagon-train of Argonauts on their way 
to the farther West, in search of homes. This memory 
served as the basis of the following lines, which I 

Ca ed THE MOVERS. 

"Westward the course of empire takes its way." 

"Whoa-haw, Buck! Gee there, you rascal, 

Get up Turk, you lazy cuss ; 
Soh there Boss, just quit your raisin* 

Such a tarnal fuss! 
Road is wide and easy sartain, 

Can't you keep the track? 
If I welt you once old Brindle, 

Bet I'll set you back !" 



IN friendship's name. 6i 

Patient plodders, faithful toilers, 

Coming all the way 
From the State of Indiana; 

Left a month to-day. 
Honest panting big-eyed cattle, 

Strong and true as steel ; 
Almost seeming interested 

In the woe and weal 
Of the stalwart sun-burned masters, 

Striding at their side ; 
Serving them with meek submission, 

Though at times they chide. 
Tramping, plodding, toiling onward, 

Many a hill to climb, 
Stepping to the "lead-bell's" music, 

Keeping perfect time. 
Moving like a cloud of whiteness, 

Shifting o'er the plain, 
Ever stretching farther westward, 

Slowly winds the train. 

Men and women, lads and lassies, 

Some too young to roam 
O'er the prairies, seeking homesteads, 

Far away from home. 
Dogs and cattle, mules and wagons, 

All in perfect trim. 
Abbott's boys from Posey county, 

Abe and Steve and Jim ; 
Old man Knox, who got discouraged 

When his "gal" turned wild, 
And his wife died broken-hearted, 

For the wayward child. 
Old Bill Thornton, who had sworn 

Indiana was a beat, 
" 'Cause the darned old rust was always 

Killin' off his wheat." 



62 TWENTY YEARS ON THE EECTURE PEATFORM. 

Yonder in the big white wagon, 

Just behind that cow, 
Sits the prettiest girl from "Posey," 

Saucy Bessie Howe ; 
Her "dad's" rich — owns land and timber, 

She'd a got it all 
If she'd stayed her eighteen summers — 

Only just till fall ; 
But you see Joe Clark came westward, 

So did she. Why? Oh— 
Well, you see, she couldn't help it, 

Seein's she loved Joe. 

AVhite-haired good old Granny Hammond, 

Eighty-three years old, 
When she couldn't raise her mortgage, 

And her farm was sold, 
Started — but she went up yonder, 

One week since to-day, 
To a homestead where she'll have no 

Mortgages to pay. 

There's the Widow Sarah Allen, 

With her idiot boy, 
Pale and thin and vacant-looking, 

Playing with a toy ; 
Some one told her that a journey 

Would bring back his mind — 
So she sold her place and brought him, 

Leaving all behind. 

Old and young, the strong and feeble, 

Bound both heart and hand 
By the ties of common purpose — 

Pilgrims through the land. 

Now the round moon casts her radiance 
O'er the grassy plain ; 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 63 

Tipping all the wheels with silver, 

Far adown the train : 
In the West, the sun departing 

Through the Golden Way, 
Flings a robe of shining crimson 

Round the dying day. 
In the lifted dome of azure, 

Shine the star-eyes bright : 
Sun and moon and stars together 

Glorify the night. 

Chains are loosed from weary cattle ; 

Hushed the "leader's" bell; 
Wagons all are drawn together 

In a square corral ; 
Soon the fires are brightly blazing, 

And the yellow flare 
Falls upon the flitting figures 

Busy everywhere. 
Abbott's boys are bringing water 

From a bubbling soring; 
Little idiot Johnny Allen 

Tries his best to sing; 
Old man Knox's eyes are misty, 

For he's thinking now 
Of his dear though wayward daughter, 

Prettier far than Bessie Howe. 

Old Bill Thornton's mad as thunder, 

'Cause the ''darned old cows" 
Will stray off upon the prairie, 

On the grass to browse. 
Joe Clark's got his arm round Bessie; 

"Now you stop!" cries she; 
"Can't you quit your stupid foolin'? 

I must help get tea." 



64 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PEATFORM. 

Supper over, young Jim Abbott 

Gets his fiddle out — 
Calls the boys and girls together 

For a dancing bout; 
"Partners all ! Come get your places ! 

'Neath the shining moon ; 
Hands across, and down the middle, 

Raise it, old Zip Coon!" 

Merrv lightsome laughing dancers, 

Full of pranks ana jest; 
Joyous brave heroic pilgrims, 

Journeying to the West. 

Many an idle belle, I fancy, 

Dying with ennui, 
In the glare of crowded ball-rooms 

Could she join their glee, 
Would be glad to leave her jewels, 

And her robes of gauze, 
Leave the empty, simpering flattery 

And the stale applause 
Of the vacant staring idiots 
Haunting Fashion's scene, 
Just for one good old cotillion 

On the prairie green. 
Ah ! well, bliss and fashion somehow, 

Often dwell apart; 
Silks and laces sometimes cover 

Many an aching heart; 
And as now, we may discover 

More of joy and rest, 
In the hearts of simple pilgrims 

Toiling to the West. 

"Half-past nine ; good-night " cried Abbott, 
Can't play any more; 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 65 

Got to start off in the morning, 

Just at half-past four." 

So it ended — soon all's silent, 

And the moon's bright beams 
Light the happy halls of slumber 

In the House of Dreams. 

Faithful toilers, patient plodders, 

Coming all the way 
From the State of Indiana ; 

Left a month to-day. 
Old man Knox at last is sleeping, 

Cried himself to rest, 
Wishing that his "gal" was with him, 

In the splendid West; 
Old Bill Thornton fell off swearing 

At a "darned old cow;" 
"Joe, dear Joe," in loving accents 

Murmurs Bessie Howe ; 
Hopeful Widow Allen — clasping 

Johnny to her breast 
Smiles — for soon her boy'll be better, 

In the glorious West. 

;fc %. s|s * % =H * 

"Sleep on, Buck, rest there, you rascal! 

Lie still Turk, you dear old cuss! 
Soh! old Boss, your'e never raisin' 

Any kind o' fuss; 
Road is long and heavy sartain, 

Hard to keep the track; 
Poor old Brindle, do you sometimes 

Wish that you was back?" 

During my stay with the Passenger Transfer Com- 
pany of Omaha, it was my fortune to be sent to Fort 
Scott, Kansas, on a business errand. After perform- 
ing my mission, I hired, one beautiful morning toward 



66 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PlyATEORM. 

the end of the month of May, a gentle old gray horse, 
one who, so said the livery man, would carry me 
safely anywhere and find the way to town again in 
the evening, should I be so unfortunate as to lose it. 
On the back of that old horse, I wandered in free 
gypsey fashion for hours upon the prairie west of the 
city. The fields were covered with flowers; daisies, 
lilies and even verbenas and geraniums grew every- 
where in a riotous bit beautiful tangle; the fields were 
a veritable sea of bloom. Now and then I slipped from 
the back of the old horse, and prone upon the ground, 
buried myself in the waves of the flowers. All day 
long I played at gypseying. For an elysian hour, I 
laid upon my back, and gazing into the sky, traced a 
thousand shapes fantastic in the feathery ferns of the 
flying clouds. Again, I trampled the myriad sword- 
blades of the grass, spared not bud or blossom, and 
snatching handfuls of the flowers, tossed the broken 
petals to the vagrant wind. I caught at the amber 
ribbons of the sunshine, and tried to twine them in 
my hair. Like a child, I prattled and crooned and 
laughed and shouted. For one long, glad, golden day, 
I was a little child. I have never forgotten that day; 
I shall never forget it, and until the meadows of 
Paradise shine upon my vision, I shall not know its 
like again. The memory of that time was the 
inspiration for the following lines: 

THE SONG OF THE PRAIRIES. 

O! what an ocean of verdure, 

Dashing its waves in glee, 
Hither and thither as summer-wind 

Sw^epeth the prairie-sea; 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 67 

Millions of nodding verbenas 

Kissed by the breeze at play, 
Over the green of each billow 

Dance in a purple spray. 

List to the lilt of the music 

Sung by each rippling wave — 
Come, for the prairies want culture, 

Come out ye laboring brave ! 
Here in the depths of this ocean, 

Down in this prairie-deep 
Waiting the hand that shall wake them, 

Harvests unnumbered sleep. 
Come from the rocks of New Hampshire, 

Come from the winters of Maine, 
Come, and the summers shall bring you 

Autumns of golden grain. 
Here there is many a reaper, 

Come from the crowded East, 
Standing with sickle expectant 

Waiting the harvest-feast. 

Linger no more where the cob-webs 

Thick with the dust of years, 
Darken your vision, till never 

Light in the future appears; 
Come to this land, where the sunshine 

Born of its God, is free, 
And the spirit of life like a glory 

Shines on the emerald sea; 
Come from the dark of oblivion, 

Come to this land of light 
Where the day with its fingers of beauty 

Shall scatter the shadows of night. 

Beggars and slaves of the East-land, 

Bond to the rule of the few, 
Here are a thousand empires 

Pleading and waiting for you ; 



68 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM- 

Waiting each one for a sovereign 

Royal and earnest and right, 
Come and be kin^s of the furrow, 

Ruling in liberty's might! 

Must we then ever be singing 

Idly, unanswered, this song? 
We shall grow weary with waiting, 

Watching and waiting so long; 
Take up our welcome, ye breezes, 

Fly with it over the sea, 
Here are fair homes for the asking, 

Tell them to come and be free — 
Go to the sons of the lily, 

Go to the men of the rose, 
Go where the green of the shamrock 

And the white of the thistle-down blows; 
If there be widows and orphans 

Weeping in hovel or cot, 
Cheer with this song of the prairies 

Offer a happier lot 
Far from the scenes of their sorrows, 

Far from their birth-born tears — 
Offer our wealth and our gladness, 

Rest in our sunnier years ; 
Go, let the welcome be echoed 

Wide oe'r the German Rhine, 
Fly to the snow-fields of Russia, 

Sing to the slaves of the mine, 

Sing to the serfs of the Czar, 
Give them a kiss and a welcome, 

Point them to liberty's star; 
Everywhere, sing to the Nations, 

These are the fields of the blest, 
Here is the Garden of Eden — 

Here in the opulent West ! 



IN FRIENDSHIP'S NAME. 69 

Lo ! as I listened, a tramping 

Made by a million feet 
Seemed to be blending its thunder 

Into that song so sweet ; 
And as I looked to the East- ward, 

Over the mountain-side, 
Down through the valleys advancing, 

Poured a living tide; 
Mighty and broad it came sweeping 

Like to an avalanche free, 
Loosed from some cloud-reaching mountain, 

Down to the prairie-sea; 
Mingling its waves with the billows 

Fringed with the purple spray — 
Spray of the nodding verbenas, 

Kissed by the wind at play! 
******* 

Song of the singing prairies ! 

Shout of the voiceful West! 
Whisper and murmur of blossom! 

Anthem of peace and rest! 
Magical charm of thy music 

Bringing the wrangling world 
Brothers in love, together 

Under our flag unfurled ! 

I wrote a number of stories, some of which were 
published at that time, notably two which I recall, 
"After the Night," and "The Charity Dutchman.'' 
Something of merit must have been in them, as they 
were published and copied by many of the journals 
of the southwest. I might have made something of 
my life in these lines, had it not been for my poverty, 
and my desire to eat self-earned bread. With the 
coming of Spring, I decided to begin again my fight 
toward the lecture-platform; however varied and 



70 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

zig-zag the way might seem, however far from the end 
in view I might stray, the determination to win in some 
fashion never left me. During my stay at the home of 
my friend, I purchased with what I had earned from 
my literary .work, a few books on Phrenology and 
Physiognomy. With the aid of these works, I composed 
a series of six lectures under the general caption of 
"The human face divine, as an index of character." 
I think it was Solomon of old, who said "A man is 
known by his look, and by his countenance when thou 
meetest him." The titles of these lectures were, "How 
to Read Character," "The Temperaments," "The 
Human Chin," "The Mouth and Nose," 'The Eyes 
and Forehead," "Love, Courtship and Marriage," and 
"A Perfect Life, the Secret of Beauty." I could not 
at once begin the delivery of these lectures, because 
I had no means of securing the illustrations in the way 
of charts, diagrams, portraits and plates necessary for 
illustration. This would require an expenditure of 
considerable money, and my cash assets were about 
four dollars at the time I decided to bid farewell to 
my friend and his hospitality, and begin again my 
bread-winning. I hit upon a plan for procuring the 
needed money for the illustration of my lectures. I 
said nothing to anyone about it, and one bright 
morning in early April, I bade "Good-bye" to the 
inmates of the delightful home, where for a little over 
three months I had been housed and fed and loved in 
"friendship's name." 



STARTING ANEW. 7 1 

IV.— STARTING ANEW. 

Sound in body, and hopeful in mind, with a satchel 
containing my clothing, a half dozen books, and the 
manuscript of my lectures on Physiognomy, and with 
four dollars and sixty-five cents in my pocket, I took 
the train for Springfield, 111. ; the cost of the ticket 
was three dollars. I reached that city before noon r 
walked from the R. R. station to a hotel, registered, 
ordered a room, and asked to be "Shown up/' first 
however eating a liberal dinner in the hotel dining- 
room. After unpacking and bestowing my effects in 
accessible corners of the closet and bureau in my 
room, I went to a drug store near the hotel, and 
purchased five pounds of French white chalk, one 
ounce each of orris root and myrrh powdered, and a 
half ounce of essence of wintergreen. This purchase 
took seventy-five cents of my remaining money. At a 
little notion store, I invested fifteen cents in tin-foil. 
With these purchases and a balance of seventy-five 
cents in my pocket, I returned to my room at the hotel.. 
I rang for a call-boy, and requested him to kindly 
bring me a pitcher of hot water. It was brought, and 
I placed the powdered chalk, orris root, myrrh and 
wintergreen in the wash-bowl in my room, poured the 
hot water upon them slowly, the while I kneaded all 
together into a paste of the consistency of baker's 
dough. This I flattened out with the back of a book 
on a table; I then cut it into pieces about an inch 
square, with a thickness of perhaps a half inch ; these 
squares I placed in the sun on the ledges of the 
windows of my room to harden. About five o'clock 



72 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

they were ready to be wrapped in the tinfoil purchased 
at the notion store. I wrapped six dozen squares. 
This work being finished to my satisfaction, I went 
to one of the largest livery stables of the city and 
engaged the handsomest open carriage the establish- 
ment afforded, with a team of white horses (they were 
beautiful animals), and a black driver to be in livery. 
I directed the proprietor of the stable to send this 
turnout to my hotel at half-past seven in the evening. 
I contracted to pay four dollars for the service for 
one occasion, with the understanding that it would 
be furnished at the rate of three dollars per night, for 
two hours at a time, should I agree to use it for three 
or more consecutive evenings. This bargain having 
been closed, I succeeded in borrowing a torch from a 
political club-room; this I filled with oil and a wick. 
A little after half-past seven, I (together with the six 
dozen squares in tin foil), was driven slowly to a 
corner of the court house square. I lighted the torch, 
deposited the little packages of chalk, etc., upon the 
rear seat of the carriage, and in loud tones announced 
myself as the Egyptian Tooth-powder man! A crowd 
of several hundred "anxious inquirers after truth" 
soon gathered about the carriage. I began a brief 
dissertation upon the beauty and value of the human 
teeth ; called attention to the fact that the mouth was 
at once the most expressive as well as fascinating 
feature of the countenance; showed how this expres- 
siveness and winsomeness depended mainly upon 
beautiful, clean and perfect teeth ; but one creature in 
all the universe had been given the power to smile, to 
laugh; that creature was man; without perfect teeth, 



STARTING ANEW. 73 

laughter was hideous; a smile was revolting, and the 
mouth as expressionless as an oyster; the teeth were 
the pearls in the oyster; a sweet disposition depended 
mainly upon sound digestion; good digestion was 
impossible without thorough mastication, and that 
could not be had without good teeth ; dyspeptics were 
a miserable people ; they were the clouds in the sky of 
life; the discord in the harmony of the music of 
humanity; the great Carlyle was a dyspeptic, and he 
had bad teeth; had he been possessed of better teeth, 
he would have had a better stomach, and therefore a 
sweeter soul ; he would have been less an iconoclast 
and more a builder ; less the philosopher of pessimism 
and more the philosopher of hope, of faith, of health- 
ful cheer; his domestic life would have been happier, 
and his wife would have experienced more of Heaven 
and less of the other place in his society! "If you 
who listen to me, desire beauty," I continued, "attrac- 
tiveness, good health, happy natures, faith in mankind 
and hope for this life and the next one, you must buy 
my tooth-powder; it is in its way the 'philosopher's 
stone,' and it will cost you but twenty-five cents a 
package !" The people began to buy the tooth-powder ; 
I sold it rapidly. "Now, gentlemen," I said, "I am not 
going to spend the time in praising the virtues of my 
little article ; you are men of sense and need no urging 
to invest in a good thing ; I intend to entertain you for 
an hour, and in the mean time you may hand up your 
quarters, and listen; that is all you have to do." I 
gave the multitude crowded about me, bits of imper- 
sonation; recitals in prose and poetry; original 
characterizations; sang songs and played solos on the 



74 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

harmonica. Some conception of the nature of that 
street entertainment may be had from the following 
portions which were rendered on that and successive 
evenings. 

"Some years ago, in a village of New Jersey, a little 
specimen of fragile humanity, less than five feet in 
height, and weighing about ninety pounds, carried on 
the business of a cofhnmaker. His face was as yellow 
as a piece of mouldy satin ; his nose was long and thin ; 
his hair was white — a dirty white ; he had a squint in the 
right eye ; he dressed commonly in faded black alpaca ; 
he was the mouldiest individual I ever heard of; his 
place of business was a tumble-down rookery in a back 
street ; over the door was a sign, which read, 'Coffins 
made for the world. Every man guaranteed a fit or 
he need not take it. Give me a trial. Silas Wegg.' He 
had a morgue or dead room in the rear of his shop, 
and from time to time he laid out the bodies of the 
departed there, and placed them in coffins, ready for 
burial. A little son, of some ten years of age, thin and 
mouldy like himself, helped him with the work, and 
meanwhile old Silas kept up a running fire of comment, 
direction and reflection. The voice of the undertaker 
was harsh and raspy; very like a cross between the 
croak of a frog and the caw of a crow. 'Neddy, my 
boy, this is a fine subject. He died o' laziness. He 
was too lazy to live. He had plenty o' money ; too lazy 
to spend it. Too lazy to draw his money out o' the 
bank, or his breath out of his lungs. Stingy, Neddy ; 
folks wanted him to have a silver door-plate on his 
coffin-lid; not he; too stingy; just write my name with 
a bit o' chalk, he says ; they'll know its me at the 



STARTING ANEW. 75 

Judgment. Sting}-, Neaay, stingy, but sharp, sharp as 
scissors. They wanted him to give somethin' toward 
puttin' a fence round the grave-yard; not he; he 
wouldn't give a cent ; why, says he, the grave-yard 
don't need a fence; them as is outside, don't want to 
get in, and them as is inside, can't get out ! His folks 
wanted him to be buried in his best suit o' Sunday 
clothes; but he wouldn't have it; preferred an old 
night-gown ; said it would be more comfortable, and he 
could lay easier ; well, there's a good deal o' sense in 
that, Neddy ; the grave ain't no place for style, Neddy ; 
and then he said it was wicked to be wasteful ; the 
clothes would rot in the grave, and if they'd only be 
patient, his boy Billy would be big enough to wear 'em 
some day. The town'll miss him ; so'll the saloons ; 
Neddy, he was the only regular customer at Bob 
Slack's, and they do say that Bob's got rich out o' 
corpse's drinkin'. He'll have to shut up shop now. Be 
careful of his head, Neddy; don't twist him. Here 
comes the hearse ; up with him ; careful ; now then, skeet 
him in; we've got to hurry; funeral's at ten, and. 
buryins like the hands o' the clock, wait for no man.' " 
"What's that? Five packages for a dollar? Very 
well, sir." (This to a customer.) At this point, I 
usually sang a ballad of which the following is a verse :. 

When the day of life is closing, 
And the shadows gather near; 

When a song of rest is chanted, 
And the eyes are filled with tears ; 

When the lips of love do falter, 

And for words, there comes a sigh — 

Heart, be strong ; they're only shadows ; 
There'll be sunshine by-and-by. 



I 



s 



76 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

"How many of you gentlemen who are going from 
this time forward to use my tooth-powder, drink 
whiskey? None of you, I hope. If you begin it, you 
had better send for Silas Wegg, and order a coffin. 
There is hope in this world for every man, except a 
drinking man. Young man, you may be handsome in 
face as the ancient Apollo, but if you drink whiskey, 
you will grow hideous ; you will be a caricature of the 
God- fashioned image you are tonight; it is a sad 
thing to despoil this fair face of ours with dissipation ; 
to mar it, and stain it with drink. Think what man 
is, the handiwork of the Divine One, 'a little lower 
I than the angels,' and yet how drink will blight him, 
I and blast him, and thrust him down to the depths of 
hell ! I do not believe there is a young man here 
tonight who would tread out the life of the veriest 
worm that crawls; he would not ruthlessly pluck 
from the earth the flowers that bloom in smiling 
gardens; he would not mar the beauteous blendings 
of the painter's pencil, and yet there are those who 
smile and scoff at the desolation of souls by the hand 
of the devil of intemperance ! My boy, don't do that ! 
(Two packages? Fifty cents. Thank you sir.) The 
man who drinks intoxicating liquors is a fool ! Genius 
itself will not prevent him from being a fool. Byron 
had genius ; he was a poet of the sweetest fancy ; that 
did not save him; gin destroyed him; gin is mightier 
than genius. A man can't write poetry and drink 
whiskey. His fancies will become fuddles. I once read 
of a poet who tried to intensify the flames of his genius 
with the fire of drink; his trial was a failure; the 
winged Pegasus he rode became a stumbling donkey, 



STARTING ANEW. 77 

and he a reeling ass. He tried five verses, with a drink 
for each verse; his rhyming went on in this fashion: 

'Slow and sad the seared leaves drop 

From off the forest trees ; 
The stately corn with tasselled top, 

Xods to the scented breeze. (Drinks.) 

The song-bird warbles in the shade, 

The blue- jay shrilly cries, 
And the cattle show their tails were made 

To keep off hungry flies. (Drinks.) 

A milk-maid with sweet face and figure, 

Goes tripping oe'r the green, 
Where an ancient white man and a nig — colored man. 

Are running a thrashing machine. (Drinks.) 

The chickens, the turkeys, the ducks and the geese, 
They all run round in the pond by the mill, 

Which is run by an old buffer named Pease — 

And — and I am reliably informed he's running it 
there still. (Drinks.) 

The inebriated son of old Pease — fell — in 
To the pond, and was never seen any more ; 

But his ghost is often observed with a bottle of gin. 
And some sandwiches — bumming round on the 
shore.' 

( No, sir ; the powder is not quite all gone ; three 
packages ? Thank you. Seventy-five cents ; that's 
right.)" 

At this juncture it was my custom to play upon a 
small mouth harmonica, a selection of sweet, well- 
known melodies, such as "Nellie Was a Lady," "The 
Mocking Bird," "The Last Rose of Summer" and 



78 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

"Annie Laurie." This portion of my program was 
invariably encored two or three times. 

After reciting a beautiful fragment from the writings 
of George D. Prentice, in which occur the lines, "It 
cannot be that our lives are but bubbles cast up on the 
•ocean of Eternity, to float awhile upon its waves, and 
then sink into nothingness ; why is it that the rain-bow 
and the clouds come over us with a beauty that is not 
of earth, and then pass off, leaving us to muse unsatis- 
fied, upon their vanished loveliness? There is a land 
where the sun-beam never fades ; where the stars shall 
be spread out before us like the islands on the ocean, 
and where the bright beings we love, shall not pass by 
us, but stay in our presence forever," a gray old man 
pushed his way to the edge of the carriage in which I 
stood, and in tremulous tones said, "Young man, I 
knew George D. Prentice; he had a great heart; he 
was a great genius, but he was weak ; that passage you 
have just recited is the sweetest one in the English 
language; it brought back the memory of my friend. 
I have no teeth, but you may give me six packages of 
jour tooth-powder!" 

My program was varied night by night (I remained 
in Springfield one week), and such sketches as "The 
Irishman's Panorama," "A Child's Vision of the 
Cross," "The Story of Hiff, the Painter," and many 
others made up the details of the entertainment. I 
invariably closed with this running fire of good 
counsel : "Young men, vou are the architects of your 
own fortunes. Rely upon your own strength of body 
and soul. Be self-reliant, honest, industrious and 
original. Be a sparrow, if nothing more, chirping 



STARTING ANEW. 79 

your own one little note, rather than a parrot with a 
dozen borrowed voices. Write on the tablet of your 
memory that 'Luck in the fight of life is a fool and a 
•coward, and pluck is a hero.' Don't take too much 
advice from other people; do some thinking for 
yourself. Think well of yourself, and others will 
think well of you. Strike out, not as they do in base- 
ball ; strike out with nerves set, and face to the music. 
Don't be envious or jealous. Shoot above the mark 
you want to hit. Don't chew tobacco. Don't swear. 
Don't read many novels. Don't read any with yellow 
covers, that you can buy for ten cents. Don't take any 
girl, no matter how willing she may be, away from 
her father's home until you have a way to support 
her. Three thousand years before Christ, an old 
Egyptian said, Tf you want your wife to love you and 
remain with you, you must feed her belly and clothe 
her back.' Be generous. Be polite. Read the papers. 
Read the Bible. Advertise. Earn money, and do good 
with it. Love truth. Love virtue. Love your country. 
Love your fellow-men. Love God. Be kind to your 
sisters. Be kind to your mothers. Throughout life, be 
wise, and you will oe, if you continue to use my 
Egyptian tooth-powder. I will be here again at half- 
past seven tomorrow night. Bring your sisters, your 
wives, your motners and your sweethearts. Good 
night." 

I was driven to the hotel, and at once retired to my 
room. My six dozen packages of Egyptian tooth- 
powder had all been sold. / had eighteen dollars in 
my pocket. 

Elated over the success of the evening, I went to 



80 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

bed about ten o'clock, and for nearly two hours lay 
awake thinking many thoughts. For some time my 
heart was filled with music ; it echoed with a song of 
hope; all sorts of happy dreams stole through the 
chambers of my brain. What I had accomplished was 
not a very great thing, and yet it was something ; had 
I discovered a mine of gold, or gathered the harvest 
of a thousand acres, or led a conquering host to 
victory, I could not have been much happier. I had 
found a door of escape from poverty and perhaps 
hardship, and had opened it. After all, the stream 
which divides failure and success, despair and rejoic- 
ing, is not very wide, and a resolute leap will carry 
us over, if we are only willing to make the trial. It 
may have been altogether a poor and foolish thing, 
and yet I was comforted with the remembrance of 
the deeds of many a great soul, whose beginnings had 
had been as petty and contemptible as mine of that> 
night. Richard Arkwrig-ht, the inventor of the loom 
and the founder of the cotton manufacture of the 
world, was only a penny barber in a London cellar; 
so, too, was Jeremy Taylor, the wonderful poet-divine ; 
Michael Faraday, the greatest of the scientists of 
England, worked with a paste-pot and brush in a 
book-binder's shop when a young man ; Robert Burns 
was a common farm-laborer, and gathered inspiration 
from the daisies while he pulverized the dirt ; Bunyan, 
the prophet and guide of every pilgrim to the Celestial 
country, in his youth went about mending tin-pots and 
kettles, and George Whitefield in cap and apron served 
the patrons of an humble restaurant with penny rolls 
and coffee. Wonderful Whitefield! How he came ur> 



STARTING ANEW. 8l 

out of the drudgery and dirt of that wretched inn, out 
of the agony of its servility and insult, until he became 
an evangelist, such as the world had never known since 
Peter the fisherman sat under the flaming tongues of 
the first Pentecost. What an orator he was ! His words 
were pictures illumined. Men listening, saw the 
scenes he painted. They heard the ripple of the waters 
of glad Galilee. They heard the moaning of the wind 
among the olive trees on the mountain-top, and their 
faces blanched to the whiteness of death as they saw 
the ghostly lips of the moon touch the pale brow of the 
stricken One, bowed beneath the awful suffering of 
Gethsemane. Wonderful Whitefield! These souls 
came up out of beginnings quite as lowly as my work 
of the street; the lesson and the glory of it all lay in 
the fact that they did not remain barber, and laborer, 
and paste-boy and tinker and waiter. I shall not 
remain a peddler of tooth-powder ; I shall go out and 
up as they did. Colossal egotism ! Ay, verily. But for 
the egotism of youth, which believes all things possible 
unto itself, and will not down, though cannons roar, 
and seas rage and caverns like to the heart of Inferno 
yawn with wide-open and threatening jaws, the world 
would be filled with mice and not men. 

So thinking, I was hopeful, determined and not 
ashamed. The value of my street experiences in the 
development of self-reliance, in the cultivation of tact, 
ready wit, self-control, and in the formation of the 
granite of will and purpose, I did not at that time ap- 
preciate. And yet it was true. I was being hammered 
into shape on the anvil of an experience which I 
needed. I was an over-sensitive youth; too much a 



82 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

woman; I needed hardening somewhat; needed more 
sand and iron in the fibre of my soul. One thing at 
least, I was strong in my determination to follow a 
straight path morally; to live a clean and temperate 
life. From the cradle, I had been taught to abhor 
intoxicating liquors, and later in life to keep before me 
the stupendous fact that to be anything worth the 
being I must shun lewd company as I would shun hell. 
I followed that line of purity; I have always walked 
in that way. Beyond question, the fact that in spite of 
a not very strong physical organization, I have always 
been able to endure much labor, much exposure, much 
of the grind and friction of the world, far beyond that 
of many men in every way bigger and stronger, is 
wholly due to that unbroken habit of temperance and 
chastity. Those who drop out of the race of life 
because of too much hard work, are in the ratio of one 
to five hundred, when compared with the army of 
those who destroy their own lives on the altars of 
drunkenness and licentiousness. Whiskey and lewd 
women are the murderers of mankind. The young man 
who follows in the shadow of a scarlet woman, or who 
pours the liquor of hell down his throat simply gives 
his body to disease and his soul to the devil. I have 
always practiced that gospel, and I preached it to my 
street audiences. I hate the liquor traffic, and I do not 
love the men who carry it on. I have more respect for 
a man who robs a bank than for him who sells intoxi- 
cating liquors. I have much sympathy, and indeed 
respect, for him who steals bread for himself or his 
children, if they be hungry ; I have neither for the man 
or the woman, old or young, who gets drunk. I loathe 



STARTING ANEW. 83 

the company of a drunken man. I always run away 
from such an one. The taint of filth and disease is in 
the smell of his garments. A drunkard once stumbled 
and fell into a gutter, where a hog lay asleep ; the foul 
fellow managed to lift his head to the stomach of the 
hog, thinking to make a pillow of it while he slept away 
the effects of his debauch; the rough action of the 
man (?) awoke the sleeping hog, who, on observing 
the character and condition of his would-be bed- 
follow, immediately got up and ran away. I am proud 
of that hog. He was a gentleman. 

I fell asleep about midnight and enjoyed a sweet and 
dreamless slumber until seven o'clock the following 
morning. After breakfasting, I procured another lot of 
chalk, orris root, etc., and prepared another batch of 
Egyptian tooth-powder. I cut the squares or cakes 
into double the size of the first lot, making them two 
inches long, one inch wide and a half inch thick; this 
•size and shape I retained until my street selling closed. 
I had a yellow label, with a picture of a pyramid, a 
sphynx and a river with lotus flowers upon its surface, 
printed, in which my cakes of powder were wrapped. 
Soon after beginning my brief career of tooth-powder 
salesman, I procured a skull-cap of black velvet, which 
1 covered with teeth; this served as a badge of my 
trade and at the same time attracted the attention of 
the curious. I remained in Springfield one week, and 
nightly until the end of my stay the crowds grew larger 
and my sales increased. On Saturday evening nearly 
two thousand people stood about the carriage, and my 
receipts reached the sum of forty-three dollars. The 
local newspapers two or three times contained notices 



84 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of "the versatile and gifted tooth-powder man who is 
entertaining our citizens at the corner of the public 
square." After settling my bills at the livery stable, 
hotel, drug-store and printing-office, I had remaining 
as the profit of the week in Springfield, one hundred 
and eighty-two dollars. Had my object been simply 
that of money-getting, I verily believe I could have 
earned ten thousand dollars a year, but then as now 
at the age of fifty-three, I cared not for money for its 
own sake. To me, money is of no value, except for 
what it will bring. I have no desire to hoard it up. 
If given my choice between a beautiful picture and a 
ten-dollar bill, I always choose the picture. As between 
a hundred dollars, and a hundred books, I prefer the 
books. I would walk farther to see an exhibition of 
flowers than a display of bank-notes. I like money, 
but I do more than like pictures and books and flowers 
— I love them; I have a little vegetable garden in the 
rear of my house, and a hundred feet of roses on the 
North side of it ; the one is useful, the other beautiful ; 
I think most of the roses. A certain man had a beau- 
tiful garden ; in the same piece of land he had a patch 
of potatoes ; an acquaintance called to see him ; together 
they walked about the place; the visitor made no re- 
mark until he came to the potato-patch. "Fine! finef 
bring a dollar a bushel. " The owner of the place was 
a lover of the beautiful, and he felt outraged at the 
failure of his visitor to say anything about the splendid 
blossoms all about him. He remained grimly silent a 
moment or two, and then said, "Whenever a gentle- 
man calls to see me he admires my flowers, but every- 
time a hog gets in he invariably roots among the 



STARTING ANEW. 85 

potatoes." As between the flowers and the potatoes, 
I am like the owner of that garden. Somewhat 
impractical? If my reader is happy in so thinking, 
"Amen" to his happiness, say I. Of such fashion am 
I, and for the fashioning, grateful to the Fashioner. I 
had other purposes in mind, and the purpose of money- 
getting filled but a small place in the economy of them. 
I continued my street-selling until the middle of Sep- 
tember, and during the time from April until that 
autumn month, I visited Canton, Bloomington, Mon- 
mouth, Ottawa and Princeton, selling upon the street 
from three days to one week in each place. The re- 
mainder of the time I occupied in reading what good 
books I could buy, and in the final completion and 
memorizing of my physiognomical lectures. I aban- 
doned my brief but altogether happy career as the 
"Egyptian tooth-powder man" at Princeton, 111., where 
I sold my preparation for two consecutive days at the 
County fair, realizing from four appearances of two 
hours each (according to a record in an old book which 
is still in my possession), one hundred and eighty-two 
dollars ! 

From Princeton I went to the city of Chicago, and 
engaged a room and board in a hotel from which some 
months before I had been ejected by the porter because 
when worn and weary from loss of food and sleep I 
had been wicked enough to fall asleep in a chair in 
the office, without having registered as a guest, or 
tipped the aforesaid porter with a crooked sixpence. 
I remained in that hotel until the first of November. 
During that time I gathered together and arranged a 
gallery of illustrations for my lectures upon "The 



86 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Human Face Divine." Eighty of them were in India 
ink, and were purchased at the establishment of Fowler 
and Wells, of New York, who made a specialty of 
preparing and selling illustrative charts and diagrams 
for lecturers upon Physiognomy, Phrenology and the 
laws of health and character. I also procured forty 
portraits in oil, effective and sufficient for my purpose, 
but cheap. These illustrations, with a half dozen 
physiological and anatomical diagrams, made up an 
attractive and useful cabinet. Early in November I 
began my lecturing at Kokomo, Ind. My plan was ta 
give the introductory lecture free, issuing compli- 
mentary tickets, and thus keeping out a mere curious, 
rabble. I then sold course tickets for five evenings at 
one dollar. This plan was always successful. It gave 
me the hearing desired, and what I had to say was of 
sufficient interest to cause many of the "first-nighters" 
to return for the course. 

Physiognomy has always been to me a fascinating 
theme. It has a broad basis of truth, both scientifically 
and morally. We all believe in it more or less. My 
mother was an intuitive reader of character from the 
look of the face. She often said to my father, "I am 
sure you cannot trust that man." She was never mis- 
taken in her conclusions, and had my father relied, 
upon her judgment he would have been better off in 
many ways. It is the fashion of most people to rely 
upon an "honest face," and as a rule that reliance may 
be trusted. Now and then, we see faces that in the 
common acceptation of the term are called beautiful, 
but if the honest look is wanting we turn away in 
disgust, repelled by the negative impulse in us. Allan 



STARTING ANEW. 87 

Pinkerton, the chief of the greatest detective agency 
this country ever had, relied mainly upon his knowl- 
edge of physiognomy for the detection of criminals. 
He could read at a glance the complex workings of 
the human mind, and in an instant decipher the almost 
infinite variety of the emotional permutations of the 
facial muscles ; this revealed to him the sought-for 
secrets, and afforded a key to the incentive as well as 
to the result of action. His world-famous exploit of 
conducting Abraham Lincoln through the sanguinary 
rebel gauntlet at Baltimore is a matter of historical 
record, and this could not have been successfully 
achieved without his ability in the art of physiognomy. 
Physiognomy in its broadest sense is the science of 
Human Xature. It comprises a knowledge of the 
whole man; anatomically, physiologically, tempera- 
mentally, phrenologically and hygienically. It covers 
the ground of his original and acquired nature, and 
treats of him therefore, not only from a physical 
standpoint, but socially, mentally, morally and spirit- 
ually. A man carries his life in his face. It is not 
difficult to determine whether the path of it be by 
the sweet meadows and still waters of purity and / 
peace, or through the slime-pits of sensuality and/ 
storm. In the extremes of this fact, we are all adepts 
at character reading. Chins, lips and eyes have stories 
to tell, and we know that if they be heavy and coarse, 
thick and bloodless, dull and leering, that a story is 
being wrought out which should make its fashioner 
ashamed. Some tread beautiful paths leading to green 
fields eternal, starred with the lilies of Christ, and 
some go down the steeps to the ocean of sin and death. 



88 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

where skeleton fingers are ever busy writing the 
epitaphs of blasted and broken lives. The human face 
is the index of these paths. 

"An artist wished to paint a face, 

The symbol of innocence and joy; 
His model was a laughing child — 

A sweet and dimpled boy. 

Long years passed on; the artist now, 

A gray old man, one picture more 
Desired to paint and call it guilt, 

A contrast to the child of yore. 

He went into a dungeon dark, 

Its cold walls damp with slime; 
He painted a wretched man chained there, 

Condemned to death for crime. 

Beside the latter, he placed the first, 

And when he came to know the prisoner's name, 
The hardened man and laughing boy 

Were, sad to say, the same. ,, 

The lines of integrity are written plainly upon the 
human countenance, and if they are wanting, the 
physiognomist can discern the absence of them. The 
face may have the straight nose, curved lips and every 
line of beauty according to the laws of ancient Greek 
art, nevertheless, the character-reader shall not be 
deceived. A traveller, who was none other than the 
great physiognomist Lavater, once visited a famous 
picture gallery in Paris; his attention became riveted 
upon the portrait of a woman; the guide noticing his 
interest, said, "What do you think of that face? Is 



STARTING ANEW. 89 

she not a most beautiful woman ?" "Beautiful enough 
as the world goes," replied Lavater, "but if the picture 
be a true likeness, she must have had a diabolical mind ; 
she must have been a brutal wretch." "You are right," 
replied the guide, "that is the portrait of Brinvilliers, 
the notorious French poisoner!" She was burned at 
the stake for her atrocious crimes. We all know that 
faces are as different as lives. That fact is evident 
everywhere. Experiences and circumstances put their 
varying imprints upon every face. Amid the busy 
scenes of mercantile life, the acquisitiveness, caution, 
shrewdness and keen judgment of the business man 
have given a look that is far different from the cast of 
countenance we see in a drawing-room, where youth 
and beauty hold hign carnival, and lip and cheek and 
eye are aglow with pleasure and excitement. Stand for 
an hour in the street of a great citv and watch the 
passersby ; here is a group, fashionably dressed, chat- 
ting scandal ; here a student, his countenance "sicklied 
oe'r with the pale cast of thought ;" here a toiler with 
a tin-pail, bronzed and firm of face; there goes a 
bloated crowd, shouting and leering; here comes a 
woman wan and white with the proof of sorrow and 
suffering in her despondent mouth and frightened 
eyes; so they come and go; the street is a gallery of 
living physiognomical illustrations. 

It is not my purpose to make of this sketch of my 
path to the Lecture-Platform a treatise on Character 
Reading ; I started out to answer the questions, "How 
did you get there ? What is the secret of your success ?" 
and I must keep to that effort. I followed the career 
of a lecturer upon Character Reading for seven years, 



90 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

during which time I travelled in five different States, 
addressed more than fourteen hundred audiences,, 
made out hundreds of character estimates, in which I 
endeavored to give wise and kindly counsel and to- 
inspire the young especially with a desire to make the 
most of life and its opportunities, especially in moral 
lines. I have received many letters of gratitude from 
men and women in all parts of the country for the 
help given them, and a generous number have been 
kind enough to say that but for my courage in pointing 
out their follies, weaknesses and vices, their lives, 
would have been a ship-wreck. To me, this is the high- 
est reward I could have. It is not a little to say that 
in the pursuance of that work I discovered and 
directed the development of the genius of the inventor 
of fire-proof paint for buildings. The most successful 
dentist of Sioux Falls, Iowa, was a boy whose talent 
I turned in that channel ; a -prominent lawyer of 
Western Ohio was another; I saved one mother's boy 
from insanity by my advice in the line of a vicious 
habit; I think I am not over-stating matters, when I 
say that I discovered and encouraged the peculiar 
poetic gifts of the now famous James Whitcomb 
Riley. I was lecturing at Marion, Indiana ; one morn- 
ing three young men came into the hall, where my 
illustrations were displayed, and where it was my 
custom to give "charts of character ;" two of the young 
men had on overalls, and were more or less be-daubed 
with yellow paint ; they were all ordinary looking fel- 
lows to the common eye ; one, who seemed about seven- 
teen years old, was positively homely ; his hair was un- 
kempt, and of the color of reddish tow; his skin was. 



STARTING ANEW. gT 

sun-burned and freckled; his mouth was large and 
weak; his faults were all written there; his chin was. 
not very strong in anatomical contour ; he had a refined 
nose, of the Greco-Roman order ; his eyes were inclined 
toward grayish-blue in color, were large, round, and 
very expressive ; his face as a whole was full of mirth 
and feeling; his temperament was intense, and exceed- 
ingly sensitive; I knew he was subject to extremes of 
mood; at times, would be wonderfully buoyant and 
happy, and again despondent ; he was short and slight 
in stature and build ; he was very awkward at first, and 
in a sort of diffident, half-mischievous way, said: "I 
would like to get a chart of my head." Those who 
were with him giggled and grinned at each other. 
"Have a chair," I said. "Take off your hat." The 
tow-headed, freckled boy had a splendid forehead just 
above the temples ; the organs of ideality and imitation 
were unusually large ; above and toward the central top 
of his frontal head, the organs of human nature and 
benevolence were largely defined; time and tune were 
also large; I saw at once that he was a poet and a 
mimic; he did not have more than ordinary causality, 
though his comparison was of the highest order; I 
knew he could not be a reasoner to any marked degree, 
and certainly not in metaphysical or mentally philo- 
sophical channels; he lacked somewhat in moral bal- 
ance ; he had a large organ of bibativeness, and would 
have to fight, and fight hard, against a desire to drink 
intoxicating liquors ; he was not sensual ; he did not 
have a very strong spiritual nature and would not be 
burdened over-much with over-weening orthodoxy in 
religious matters ; he was intensely human, and his love 



$2 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

of nature, love of his own, especially his mother, were 
all large; he was an attractive study. I told him he 
would make a poet, an actor and an impersonator. I 
urged him to cultivate those gifts ; I lectured him along 
the line of habit and appetite, and counseled constant 
self-control; he was greatly pleased with my diagno- 
sis, and thanked me with considerable warmth, saying 
that most folks called him a "good-for-nothing and a 
fool." He was a sort of Robert Burns ; if I remember 
rightly, I quoted for him these lines of the plowman- 
poet of Scotland, as a last word of warning : 

"Reader, attend ; whether thy soul 

Soars fancy's flights above the pole, 
Or darkling grubs this earthly hole 

In low pursuit, 
Know prudent, cautious self-control 

Is wisdom's root." 

He is famous to-day. Many lips have smiled, and 
many eyes have moistened; many hearts have kept 
time to the measure of his mirth, and to the lilt of his 
love-laden music ; he has made the most of his genius 
and his life. It is something to have been in a way, 
the guide and prophet of James Whitcomb Riley. 

From time to time, I added new lectures to my list, 
so that during the last three years of my labor in this 
field, I had two complete courses of six each. The sub- 
jects of the second course were "Lights and Shadows 
of Human Character," "Child Life," "Peculiar Peo- 
ple," "Failure and Success," "The Beautiful," and 
"Man, Science and the Soul." My cabinet of illustra- 
tions increased in size and quality, and contained more 
than three hundred subjects. The list comprised poets, 



STARTING ANEW. 93 

statesmen, warriors, authors, historians, philosophers, 
pugilists, novelists, thieves, murderers, artists, inven- 
tors, mechanics, laborers, confidence men and women, 
discoverers, adventurers, wits, hermits, merchants, 
good and bad husbands and wives, children, ethnologi- 
cal types, animal resemblances, and many quaint, 
strange and exceptional characters of all countries and 
periods of time. In order to use this immense collec- 
tion intelligently and effectively, I was compelled to 
store my mind with an almost endless amount of his- 
toric and biographic knowledge; the connection 
between the various characters exhibited and the laws 
of physiognomy had to be sought out and presented 
simply and tersely; visitors to the cabinet asked 
hundreds of questions, all of which must be answered ; 
my audiences were given much information concern- 
ing the talented, the wise and good, as well as of the 
stupid, the foolish and the vile ; all this information of 
course had to be accurate; some conception of my 
methods may be had from the following citation taken 
from my lecture on "Peculiar People," describing the 
famous poets Whitman and Poe : "This is the portrait 
of Walt Whitman, perhaps the most original and 
eccentric poet of America. Like old Izaak Walton, he 
has spent much of his life in fishing. Mr. Whitman 
is not fond of society ; fashion he despises ; sham, he 
denounces, and the worship of mammon he calls the 
curse of the ages. He has an odd massive face and 
head, plenty of Drain room, a shock of tangled hair, a 
somewhat sad though earnest expression, kindly gray 
eyes, and a mouth sensitive but somewhat coarse, with 
the strong chin of determination. He dresses plainly, 



94 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

almost shabbily, and wishes only to be comfortable. 
His poetic fancy runs in unusual grooves. The mind 
of the ordinary regulation poet runs in the way of the 
breeze, the flowers, the sky, the birds of the summer, 
the laughter of streams, and the music of the ocean; 
Whitman sings of the passions, of mighty deeds, of 
the sinning and the wayward, of stones and dusty 
streets, of geese and pig-pens, of cow-sheds and fac- 
tories, and much of the coarse and commonplace of 
life. He idealizes all these ; lifts all these into the 
realms of the sublime. He finds volumes where most 
people find nothing; that which to the ordinary 
observer is vulgar, to him is refined and sacred. His 
heart is an open door to all humanity, and he excludes 
no man, no woman from the sympathy of his soul. The 
veriest harlot is an honored guest in the innermost 
sanctum of his tenderness and love. 

"Not until the sun excludes thee, 
Will I exclude thee," he sings. 

Emerson calls him the most original man in 
American literature, and the truest philosopher since 
Plato. Physiognomy endorses the verdict of Emer- 
son. His chief work is called 'Leaves of Grass.' " 

"This is the portrait of Edgar Allan Poe. Upon 
the roll of American authors his name is distinctly 
unique. He is a sublime mad-man, and like Eugene 
Aram walks apart. Physiognomy alone can afford the 
nearest conception of him. As a man is, so he looks. 
His countenance is highly ideal, and exceedingly 
strong in the upper portion ; it is correspondingly weak 
in the lower portion; his is an unbalanced physiog- 
nomy. His organization throughout is precocious. The 



STARTING ANEW. 95 

Ijrain is more than the slight body can bear, and he 
suffered what healthy, well-balanced people cannot 
understand. He is of the most delicate texture, and the 
harp of his senses is swept by a hundred moods and 
passions. He is a human barometer, and the mercury 
of his soul goes up and down with the weather of his 
surroundings. The touch of the slightest finger of 
circumstance moves and often disturbs him. He is a 
responsive instrument, and like an instrument, not his 
own master. The forehead is high and wide in the 
upper reflective region. The ideal faculties are tre- 
mendous; they are in excess of everything else, and 
consequently he enjoyed only those things which were 
exquisitely beautiful. For this reason, contact with 
the practical work-a-day world made him wretched. 
The reaction from over-ideality always renders a man 
morbid, irritable, cynical and frequently intemperate. 
It is the price which undue genius must sometimes pay. 
His eyes are violet gray, exceedingly round, large and 
prominent; they blaze with expression, and yet are 
sad eyes. His nose is straight and refined, and 
approaches the Greek in outline; the Greek nose is of 
all noses the most beautiful, and is indicative of great 
love of the beautiful. His chin is small and weak, 
expressing a lack of will, and without will man is an 
anchorless, rudderless ship, at the mercy of every 
wind and wave. His mouth is as sensitive and as 
impulsive as a gentle, tender woman's, and as sweet. 
The key to the character of Edgar Allen Poe lies in 
this analysis of his physiogonomy. As a word painter 
of wierd pictures, he stands unrivaled. The bilious 
and nervous nature of his temperament render him a 



9& TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

slave to the sombre and melancholy things of life and 
thought. Beautiful things come to him in minor 
strains, in dreary undertones, and to him the 
dreary things are beautiful. Measured and rhythmic, 
the music of his poetry is all in a minor key. Sadness 
is his principal key-note, and regret is the burden of 
most of his singing. As a boy, he loved to creep into 
the dim corner of a cob-webbed garret, and by the half- 
light of a stolen candle, read and ponder over some 
grotesque legend, beautiful in the spirit of its fear, 
and fearful in its beauty. If the wind moaned a dirge 
about the creaking house, or the rats scampered across 
the floor, or squeaked in their holes, he was happy. 
His poem of 'The Raven' is like a shadow on the 
heart, but it is a beautiful shadow, solemnly beautiful 
— such a shadow as the moonlight makes in the 
branches of cypress trees. Up and down the halls of 
Poe's imagination stepped troops of seraphims, their 
ankles hung about with silver bells, but the music of 
the bells was muffled, and the echoes of the dancing 
feet upon the floor came in stifled tones. His poem of 
'The City in the Sea' is a picture bathed in mystical 
light, but the light is lurid and hideous. The towers 
of the city sink and the tide rolls over them like a fire 
of blood. 

" 'And when amid no earthly moans, 

Down, down, that town shall settle hence, 

Hell, rising from a thousand thrones 
Shall do it reverence! 

His poem of the 'Conqueror Worm' moans out the 
hopelessness of vigils among the tombs of the dead. 
The soul of the poet, standing in the midst of the 



STARTING ANEW. 97 

white ghosts of the marble monuments, cries out to 
the night for some word from the silent sleepers 
beneath his feet. If the human heart would have the 
comfort of the hope of immortality, it must seek at 
some other door, for with Poe, 

" 'The play is the tragedy-Man, 
And its hero, the Conqueror Worm !' 

Poe is to poetry what Dore is to pictures; a wierd y 
fantastic artist of the night — the prince of shadow 
painters. With all his peculiarities of impulse, Poe was 
not an immoral man, as some biographers claim. 
Physiognomy sets that charge at rest once and forever. 
Poets are often weak, but they are not systematically 
sensual. To the mind of Edgar Allan Poe, woman was 
a type of the celestially beautiful, and in her presence 
he was calmed and subdued. Had he been given, as the 
companion of his life, a wife, pure, loving, demonstra- 
tive, yet well-balanced and practical, whose nature 
would have been his anchor and his guide, he would 
not have gone to wreck in the madness of drunken- 
ness. He was not immoral, and yet he taught no 
moralty, had no moral standard. The ideal governed 
him, and that is not enough, and the house of his 
soul though beautiful, fell with a crash, for it was 
built upon the sand. The words found at the begin- 
ning of his production called "Ligeia," tell all the 
story : 

"Man doth not yield himself to the angels, nor 
unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of 
his own feeble will." 

With rare exceptions, mv work called forth the 
highest commendations of the public and the press for 



98 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

its value and its wide range of information, and almost 
invariably I was personally accepted as a sincere and 
unassuming teacher, as indeed I aimed to be. Two or 
three times, the editor of some newspaper made me 
the object of his abuse or his levity. 

The uniform verdict concerning my work ran about 
as follows: "Dr. Hedley's lectures on Physiognomy 
are being attended by large audiences. All who hear 
him are delighted and freely acknowledge the beauty 
and force of his reasoning, the practical value of his 
philosophy, the elegance and charm of his style, and the 
pathos and power of his eloquence. No lecturer on a 
kindred subject has ever excited so deep an interest, 
or more thoroughly entertained and interested his 
hearers." This notice appeared in the "Messenger" of 
the old conservative and cultured town of Canan- 
daigua, N. Y. The following month, I lectured in 
Warsaw, N. Y., and it pleased the editor of the 
"Democrat" to deliver himself of the following 
immortal words : 

"An egotistical 'Prof.' has been boring people at the 
Court House during the past week with a re-hash of 
the sayings of Fowler and other men of note. The 
sickest thing was a windy set-out of love, courtship, 
etc., last Monday. His photograph may be found at 
the Post Office, labeled, This is Prof, the handsome 
boy. Look at him — ain't he pretty?' " As I had never 
read any of the works of O. S. Fowler, the phrenol- 
ogist, and was a disciple simply of Lavater, the 
physiognomist, this far-seeing editor was evidently 
mistaken. As to the label on my picture in the Post 
Office, his statement was a lie ; a lunatic would not so 



STARTING ANEW. 99 

speak of himself. The night after the notice appeared 
my audience was greatly increased in numbers; it 
may have been due to the fact that I believed myself 
to be a "pretty boy," and the people wished to see and 
judge for themselves. 

Criticism, like the ways of the Heathen "Chinee," 
is often "strange and peculiar" and frequently past 
finding out. It may be safely conceded that the esti- 
mates and judgments of the critic are the outcome of 
his mental equipment — his capacity; if he lacks 
capacity, what can one expect ? On the other hand, the 
man who denounces the critic as being devoid of 
capacity, may himself be wanting in that commodity; 
how then shall he judge of the criticism? A history 
of the criticisms pronounced upon the greatest produc- 
tions of the world of literature would be a very 
strange and amusing history. Jealousy, envy, bigotry, 
ignorance and self-conceit warp the judgment of many 
a critic, and he is so frequently limited by the pressure 
of circumstances and influences about him, that it is 
often doubtful whether he dare express an honest 
conviction, even when he is capable of giving it. 
Rymer, for whom Dryden had profound admiration, 
denounced Shakspeare as "raving and rambling in 
tragedy, and devoid of the faintest spark of reason." 
Voltaire called the tragedies of Shakspeare farces. 
Wallack, the famous actor, once attempted to read the 
famous witch scene in Macbeth to a French friend, 
when he broke out with violent exclamations of dis- 
gust : "Dis is not nature ! Dis is not common sense ! 
No, no, nevare! De tree old veetch shall nevaire to 
go out to meet upon de blasted heath in tondare and 
LcfC. 



IOO TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

lightning and rain, with no clothes on! No, nevaire. 
Day be not such fools ! Day stay at home till de 
wezzer clear up !" Dr. Samuel Johnson said he "would 
hang a dog who would be fool enough to read Milton's 
'Paradise Lost' twice." Of the luxuriant dreaminess 
and harp-like music of Thomson's "Castle of Indol- 
ence," Gray could only say "Hifalutin rot !" and of the 
novels of Sir Walter Scott, he said, "They are all 
alike; conglomerations of heraldry, falconry, mins- 
trelsy, scenery, monkery, witchery and deviltry !" The 
rarest thing in the world, the gem inestimable, would 
be a piece of criticism which all men could agree upon 
as thoroughly honest and truthful. I stand ready to 
exchange my library for such a criticism. The man 
of genius is no more qualified to decide upon the merit 
of any production than the plodding unthinking 
million, for the genius having certain qualities of mind 
developed beyond the rest is necessarily one-sided in 
his mental vision. I do not recall the name of a truly 
great man who was well proportioned ; there is excess 
in all greatness, and the judgment of such cannot be 
equally and generally good or sound. 

I am quite persuaded that, Physiognomy to the 
contrary notwithstanding, we can never know each 
other wholly on this earth; what another life may do 
for us in that land where we shall "know as we are 
known" is another matter, and of that we know nothing 
as tangible and absolute; we receive and proclaim 
wholly through faith, i do not recall the name of a 
man or woman who ever believed they were fully 
appreciated, and I am inclined to concede the justice of 
that claim ; the trouble with most of us is that we labor 



STARTING ANEW. IOI 

under the delusion that we fairly and honestly 
appreciate others. If we always persist in thinking 
more of ourselves than we do of others, we shall 
always have some cause for grievance. The best way 
in life is to go straight on, with what of honest pur- 
pose we can command, with no thought of critic, and 
without fear of those who seem to be our enemies. If 
an enemy, fancied or genuine, gets in the way of our 
feet, we should walk around him, calmly, bravely, and 
with the charity of Him who said, "Judge not, lest ye 
be judged." It is foolish to worry over what we think 
others may think; in reality, I am of the opinion that 
they think but little. When peradventure a good man 
dies, there can be found in all the earth but a little 
remnant of friends who can, or will say, "I think I 
remember him." 

During the autumn of 1877 I delivered a course of 
six lectures at Springfield, O., under the auspices of 
the "Philosophian Society" of Wittenburg University. 
The course was a very great success in every way and 
netted the Society something over three hundred 
dollars. For my lecture on "Love, Courtship and 
Marriage," thirteen hundred reserved seats were sold 
before ten a. m. ; my work called forth the unqualified 
commendation of the gifted and noble President of 
the University, Samuel Sprecher, D.D., L.L.D. Before 
leaving the city I was made an honorary member of 
the "Philosophian Society." During my stay in Spring- 
field, John B. Gough, whose lectures had so impressed 
me in my youth, was to deliver an address upon 
"Temperance" on Sunday afternoon at Black's Opera 
House. He had spoken the night before in the same 



102 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PEATFORM. 

place upon "Personal and Platform Experiences." I 
heard that lecture. It did not reach the heights as did 
the subjects I had heard in my boyhood. He was 
evidently failing. After that lecture he was ill at the 
home of Mr. Nichols, the editor of the "Republic.'' 
The hour for Mr. Gough's appearance drew nigh. I 
was on the point of starting for the Opera House to 
hear him, when a message was brought asking if I 
would address Mr. Gough's audience that afternoon. 
If I would, Mr. Gough would be very grateful. The 
thought of his great theme entitled "Circumstances" 
came to me. Here was an opportunity. I availed 
myself of it, and I am proud to be able to say that Mr. 
Gough's audience remained to hear me through. A 
week later the great lecturer had recovered and was at 
Urbana, Ohio. I called at his room in the hotel, and 
gave him my name. He was making his toilet for the 
evening. Putting out his hand, he shook mine warmly, 
and said, "This is the young man who talked on 
'Temperance' for me last Sabbath at Springfield. They 
told me of the good you did that day. I hope you may 
be spared to repeat it many times. I must be at the hall 
soon, and will ask you to kindly excuse me." My heart 
was full, and my lips silent. I could not say anything. 
The joy of that moment will never be forgotten. 

In connection with my Physiognomical work, I 
delivered many addresses upon "Temperance ;" almost 
every Sunday night I faced a crowded audience in 
some church; for these lectures I made no charge; 
much good was accomplished; many pledges were 
signed by those who were moved and convinced by 
what I had to say, determined to live thereafter lives 



STARTING ANEW. I03 

of absolute sobriety; at the close of a temperance 
appeal at Avoca, N. Y., more than two hundred persons 
expressed a determination over their signatures never 
to drink intoxicating liquors. 

At North East, Pa., it was my good fortune to meet 
and listen to a lecture entitled "Motive Power, or 
What Made Him Do It?" by that exquisite poet and 
master of beautiful prose, Benjamin F. Taylor. He 
possessed, in spite of a stockily-built physical organi- 
zation, a highly nervous temperament. I never shall 
forget how he suffered all the afternoon, in anticipa- 
tion of what to him was evidently a trial in the 
evening. He lay upon a couch in his room at the hotel, 
partly dressed, wet from continuous perspiration. He 
did not dare to put on clean linen for the lecture until 
the last moment before starting for the hall. Upon 
the platform, nothing was visible of the lecturer but 
his face; his body was completely hidden behind a 
draped box, which covered him to the chin ; upon this 
box he had a lamp, and his manuscript, from which he 
read his address; he rarely lifted his eyes from the 
paper. He had a winsome expressive face, and a 
pleasant though not very musical voice; he was not 
an orator; I do not remember that he made a single 
gesture during the delivery of the lecture, which 
consumed nearly two hours. The central thought of 
the subject was that adverse circumstances had been 
with most good and true men and women an incentive 
to effort, and a factor of success in life. Poverty was 
one of the greatest of motive powers. I endorsed all 
he said ; I knew it to be true in my case at least. Mr. 
Taylor's sentences were strings of pearls, and they 



104 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

fell from his lips in showers. It was like the unrolling 
of a panorama ; it was an ever varying canvas of verbal 
pictures. One forgot his painful and somewhat ridicu- 
lous appearance, with all it implied of box, drapery, 
lamp, manuscript and perspiration, in the charm of his 
rhetoric and the sympathetic tenor of his thought. 
During the lecture he recounted his own experience in 
an attic-room in New York, when penniless and 
hungry, there came to him an opportunity to compete 
with others in the writing of a New Year's address for 
a journal of the city; fifty dollars was to be the com- 
pensation to the successful author; poverty and the 
need of food and warm clothing, indeed the iron law 
of necessity, the scorpion whip of adverse circumstance 
was the motive power; he won the prize, and in the 
winning made himself famous with the following 
lines, which made up a part of the New Year's address : 

THE RIVER OF TIME. 

Oh, a wonderful stream is the River Time, 

As it flows through the realm of Tears, 
With a faultless rhythm and a musical rhyme, 
And a broader sweep and a surge sublime, 
As it blends with the ocean of years. 

How the winters are drifting like flakes of snow! 

And the summers like buds between; 
And the year in the sheaf — so they come and they go 
On the river's breast with its ebb and flow, 

As they glide in the shadow and sheen. 

There's a magical Isle up the river Time, 
Where the softest of airs are playing; 

There's a cloudless sky and a tropical clime, 

And a voice as sweet as a vesper chime, 
And the Junes with the roses are straying. 



STARTING ANEW. I05 

And the name of this Isle is the Long Ago ; 

And we buried our treasures there ; 
There are brows of beauty and bosoms of snow — 
There are heaps of dust — but we love them so ! 

There are trinkets and tresses of hair. 

There are fragments of song that nobody sings, 

And a part of an infant prayer; 
There's a harp unswept and a lute without strings, 
There are broken vows and pieces of rings, 

And the garments that she used to wear. 

There are hands that are waved when the fairy shore 

By the mirage is lifted in air ; 
And we sometimes hear through the turbulent roar 
Sweet voices we heard in the days gone before, 

When the wind down the River is fair. 

Oh, remembered for aye, be the blessed Isle, 

All the day of our life till night ; 
And when evening comes with its beautiful smile, 
And our eyes are closing in slumber awhile, 

May that "Greenwood" of soul be in sight. 

One afternoon, in the village of Angelica, N. Y., I 
was sitting in my room engaged in sewing a button 
on my coat, when there came a loud rap at the door. 
I opened the door, and a massive, impressive-looking 
man, a counterpart of Daniel Webster, entered, and 
sat down on the edge of the bed — the room afforded 
but one chair. He looked into my eyes searchingly for 
some little time ; I remained silent under the scrutiny. 
Presently, in a blunt honest fashion, he said, "Young 
man, you're a fool ! I have listened to you every night 
for a week and I have figured you out. You will never 
succeed to any colossal extent so long as you keep to 



Io6 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

scientific subjects. You are a poet, an orator and an 
actor. I heard you last night at the Methodist Church 
on 'Temperance/ and you swayed the people as the 
wind sweeps the long grass of a meadow. You don't 
seem to know just how to turn to best advantage the 
gifts your Creator has blessed you with. Young man, 
hit upon some subject that will appeal to the hearts 
of your listeners rather than their heads. Your soul is. 
bigger than your brain, my boy. Get the people in 
touch with your soul; I am a tough, hard-headed old 
lawyer, but there's something about you that has done 
me good. I believe I am sweeter and have more faith 
in men since having heard you. Let me quote the poet, 
'Throw physic to the dogs' — toss your physiology, 
physiognomy and hygiene out of the window, and use 
your skill m healing the scarred hearts and binding up 
the wounds of the souls of men and women ! Give the 
young the benefit of your courage and hope and faith, 
and you will find your place. Don't be a fool any 
longer. My name is Grover ; good bye." He was Hon. 
Martin Grover, one of the eminent jurists of New York. 
He went away as abruptly as he came. I looked after 
him as one looks upon the vision of a man trans- 
figured. For an hour I sat with thumping heart and 
tear-wet eyes, yet in ecstasy. The blunt old lawyer had 
left behind him the "philosopher's stone." He had 
solved the riddle of life for a misplaced brother. From 
that moment I turned my face toward the work of my 
life as the world to-day knows it. 

I disposed of my cabinet of illustrations for less than 
one-half of its cost to a gentleman of Painesville, Ohio, 
who had heard me and wished to pursue the subject of 



STARTING ANEW. 10^ 

character reading along the lines in which for seven 
years I had labored. I bade farewell to Physiognomy. 
It had been to me a wonderful school. I had been in 
touch with the myriad phases of human nature. It 
had given me an added faith in mankind. Man, a being 
of infinite value, has within himself, the richest 
materials for the noblest character building. His. 
talents, gifts, affections, thoughts, actions, appetites, 
passions and vices are all keys with which to unlock 
the doors of the palace of the soul. If he will but see 
and strive aright, he may do more than make his life a 
succession of slips in sensual mire. He may walk 
uprightly. He may lift his head to the stars. If he be 
hopeful and strong in his faith, unswerving in his 
work, he may lend his voice to songs of joy, and may- 
join in the "hosannas" of the celestials. Out of love 
and hate; out of hoping and fearing; out of winning 
and losing; out of plenty and hunger, honor and shame, 
candor and deceit, love and loathing, and every thread 
of the warp and woof of character, he may fashion the 
fabric of a perfect man. He may build out of the 
materials within him a white monument, storied with 
the worth and the glory of those who are of the order 
of God's own peculiar people. 



Io8 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 



V.— THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 

The change from the demand and tension of my life 
to a condition of inactivity and quiet, revealed the fact 
that I was not well ; the incessant travel and continu- 
ous labor, together with the anxiety of it all, had told 
upon my health, and for many weeks I was on the 
border of nervous collapse. The need of rest was 
imperative, and for a period of three months my mind 
was a piece of fallowed ground, untilled and unseeded. 
In the early summer of 1880 I was sufficiently recov- 
ered to turn my attention to the preparation of a lecture 
along the lines which the brave old lawyer had pointed 
out as the proper field for my best work. In spite of 
the sacrifices and adversities of my life, I was still 
strong in courage and hope ; there had been much of 
bitterness and shadow, and yet I was still sweet and 
sunny, and so somehow my thought turned toward 
cheery things. I believed with the poet that, 

"All places that the eye of Heaven visits 

Are to the wise man ports and happy havens;" 

I believed that God made all men to be happy, and that 
if a man is unhappy it must be his own fault. There is 
such a thing as the duty of happiness. The man who 
permits himself to fall into the servitude of sorrow 
and complaining is a sinner. Happiness is to be had 
for the asking — that is, for the willing; we may will 
to b$ happy. Happiness is purely and wholly a per- 
sonal condition, a state of the mind, the heart and the 
conscience. It is not dependent upon surroundings, 
no matter how the wand of prosperity may have 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I09 

touched into comfort and beauty the fabric of our 
lives, or the fingers of nature may have sketched into 
the landscape and the sky their glory and light. Hap- 
piness — the soul of the sunny side of lif~ — is within 
us, not without us. Everything in my past experience 
emphasized the truth of this philosophy, and so think- 
ing and believing, I began the preparation of a lecture 
to be called "The Sunny Side of Life." I would go 
before the world with a message of hope and cheer. I 
would teach them to look on the bright side of things, 
to make the most of adversity, and to wish for and be 
content with little rather than much. I would hold up 
as an example worthy of imitation, the spirit of that 
chap, who, when hungry, pawned his coat for a loaf 
of bread, and when a dog stole the bread and ran away 
with it, said "Thank Heaven, I still have my appetite 
left!" I would teach men that even at the best, hap- 
piness is relative, comparative. A Persian philosopher 
bewailed his fate because he had no shoes, but when 
he met a man on the highway without feet, he was 
ashamed of his discontent, and determined never again 
to complain. My lecture, then, should be along such 
lines. I devoted many weeks to its preparation. It 
was all written out, and committed to memory, ver- 
batim. 

Much of the work of composition was done in a 
quiet corner of Mount Hope, that beautiful "God's 
Acre" in the city of Rochester, N. Y., which was at 
that time the place of my residence. In the midst of 
cypress trees and willows and tombs, and with the 
dust of the dead about and beneath me, I hammered 
"The Sunny Side of Life" into shape for public deliv- 



IIO TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

ery. A strange place in which to live over the thoughts 
of such a theme ! Nay, rather a fit place. The world 
is full of living dead, who need the touch and the 
voice of the sort of inspiration which may be had in 
the stories and lessons of monuments, and the comfort 
of the silent fellowship of those who have gone by the 
way of the windowless palaces of death to a newer and 
fuller life in the Celestial City. In the long twilight of 
the summer evenings of 1880 I wandered for miles out 
into the sweet country lanes and fields alone, and there 
repeated aloud hundreds of times the words of my 
lecture. I experimented with many forms of modula- 
tion, and tried all sorts of intonation to find the most 
effective method of delivery. I was governed by no 
se^ rules of elocution; I never took but one lesson in 
/elocution in my life. A certain professor at an earlier 
period, undertook to make an elocutionist of me; he 
consumed an entire afternoon in attempting to teach 
me how to say "Whoa" with various shades of inflec- 
tion. I succeeded in frightening most of the horses in 
the neighborhood. There was at least one runaway 
during my lesson. It was an afternoon of agony to 
me. I have never tried it since. Doubtless there are 
many speakers, or at least those who desire to become 
such, for whom a course of elocutionary instruction 
would be of great benefit. This is not true however 
with those who are natural elocutionists. Some are 
born with the gift of clear and effective pronunciation. 
I have a little daughter of four years of age whose 
perfection of enunciation is a delight to hear. I may be 
pardoned for saying that at her age I had similar gifts 
of speech. Practice, however, of the gifts we have is 



THE) LYCEUM PLATFORM. Ill 

•essential to the best results. Mrs. Siddons, "the tragic 
muse" of England, incessantly rehearsed her great 
dramatic parts aloud. The delivery of the wonderful 
Whitefield was at its best after forty or more public 
-repetitions of his sermons. Demosthenes frequently 
talked for days against the voice of the sea and the 
shout of storms. Confidence, physical earnestness, and 
that action which is of the temperament and the emo- 
tions rather than the body, are essential to power, and 
therefore to success. 

The first aim of a speaker should be to make himself 
heard. This does not mean that he is to be a marvel of 
mere noise. A certain Roman orator was once recom- 
mended because his voice was of such quality as well 
-as quantity that he could drown the noise of a hun- 
dred passing wagons, but on trial at the forum it was 
found that his listeners could not understand his 
words; they said they could not hear him. Clearness 
of utterance and what may be called a reaching pitch 
need to be sought after. The cornet can be heard 
farther than the trombone. The violin is never lost, 
however tremendous may be the volume of all the rest 
of the orchestra. A speaker, to have power, must be 
himself; he will be weak if he imitates another. This 
is the reason why the average elocutionist is a failure ; 
he reflects his teacher ; he imitates his teacher, instead 
of expressing himself. There must be the fire of earn- 
estness, or in other words, the magnetism of sincerity ; 
the speaker must mean what he says; he must be 
honest. If I know that my house is on fire, believe it 
to be on fire, I shall announce that fact with sincerity, 
and I shall announce it effectively, no teacher of 



112 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

elocution will be required to instruct me as to the 
most convincing method of speech with relation to that 
calamity. I always endeavor to feel and live my 
lectures, to be as much a part of them as I should be 
of the catastrophe of my burning home. It is this fire 
of feeling that renders the preaching of Talmage so 
effective in spite of a voice the tones of which are harsh 
to the last degree. He distracts the ear, but he rends 
the heart, and lifts his hearers to the mountain-heights 
of emotion. He is an orator. Elocutionists may be 
made, but orators are born. Just so nearly as the 
elocutionist can simulate the orator, will he be 
effective. 

The great lecturer must do something more than 
discourse; he must act; he must be dramatic. A lec- 
turer may employ every means of the speaker's art, but 
if he be not dramatic he will fail to reach the heights. 
He may, on the contrary, lack every other gift, but if 
he possesses the dramatic instinct he shall be a master. 
John B. Gough was an illustration of this. He was 
exclusively dramatic. He was first, last and all the 
time an actor. When failing health deprived him of 
physical intensity, his occupation was gene, because 
he could no longer be dramatic. His platform efforts 
during the last months of his life were pitiable per- 
formances to witness. He was not strong enough to 
light and feed the conflagration of his passions. I 
have listened to him in the days of his power, when 
he seemed divinely inspired. It seemed as if he 
would consume himself. The effects of his blazing 
utterances were at times appalling. He described a 
boy hanging over a precipice of jagged rocks by a 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 113 

thin strand of rope ; the wind swung him to and fro ; 
the thin rope grew thinner and thinner as it pressed 
upon the knife-like edges of the stones on either hand ; 
at last the slender cord was broken; the last thread 
snapped; a woman, sitting near me, sprang from her 
seat and shrieked, "My God, the boy has fallen!" I 
have heard him tell of the home-coming of a drunkard, 
when frenzied and mad from the brew of hell he 
snatched his prattling babe from a cradle and flung 
it against the wall of the room ; it was awful ; the blood 
and brains of the child seemed to be spattered all about 
me. He was an actor, and for that reason he was a 
great orator. 

After the completion of "The Sunny Side of Life," 
I applied to a lecture agency, styled the "American 
Literary Bureau," for a place upon its list of platform 
attractions. I put myself in the market. I placed the 
fee for my services at one hundred dollars. My name 
was promptly accepted by the manager of the Bureau, 
on condition that I pay to him a booking fee of twenty- 
five dollars. The booking fee was the beginning and 
the end of our business relations ; I received no appli- 
cations to lecture. It did not occur to me then that a 
young man of thirty-two years of age, with no special 
reputation among the lyceum committees and patrons 
of the country, could not hope to be sought after at any 
such price, and indeed, not to any great extent at any 
price. I was in the market to be sure, but I had no 
market value ; only those commodities will sell for 
which there is a demand. That a demand may exist, 
there must be something more than worth, which is the 
chief and abiding requisite; there must be reputation. 



114 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

I had no reputation. I was in the market, and out of 
the market. The fact was, I had no market. 

It was not until the early summer of 1881 that I 
again made application to a Lecture Bureau for a 
place upon its list of attractions. This time I wrote to 
that genial soul and able manager Henry L. Slay- 
ton of Chicago. He has made reputations for a 
greater number of platform artists than have all the 
other managers of the country combined. The Slayton 
Bureau is the lecturer's kindergarten ; out of it, led by 
the kindly gentle hand of its big-hearted preceptor, 
Henry L. Slayton, the uncertain feet of many an infant 
lecturer have safely toddled to the highest places in 
the university of the platform, strong, masterful and 
successful because of his encouraging words and wise 
guidance. In reply to my letter Mr. Slayton wrote, "I 
am willing to give you a trial. I have heard some 
favorable things said of you by those who have 
listened to you in your former work. You must not, 
however, expect too much at first. I may be able to 
obtain thirty or forty dollars per lecture for you for a 
limited number of nights. I will do the best I can for 
you, and if your "Sunny Side of Life" makes a 
success you may confidently expect to make a place 
which will abide." 

My first engagement was at Brookville, Pa., in 
November, 1881. My audience consisted mainly of 
teachers who had convened for instruction during the 
day and entertainment and inspiration at night during 
a Teacher's Institute, whose session continued during 
one week. I believe I suffered more in my room at the 
village hotel from worry and anxiety as to the result 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 115 

of my effort in the evening than even Benjamin F. 
Taylor, of whom I have already spoken. I did not 
perspire as he did ; I was cold and nervous ; it seemed 
several times as if my heart would cease to beat. On 
reaching the platform at the Court House where I 
was to speak, I was in a state of the highest nervous 
tension; as I sat waiting to be introduced, my feet 
played a tattoo upon the floor, and it seemed as if I 
could hardly breathe; my feet and hands were cold 
as ice, and my mouth was hot and dry. I had lectured 
more than fifteen hundred times under other circum- 
stances, and yet was in that condition. It is all 
accounted for in the fact that I was on trial in a new 
field of labor. Everything in my life had tended 
to that supreme hour. I had reached the beginning 
of the end of my ambition. The time had come when 
I must win or lose. I was where the actress and the 
lawyer told me I belonged. I was to make the test. I 
was on trial. I seized a glass of water from the judge's 
bench and drained it to the bottom. The moment I 
rose to my feet all fear and trepidation vanished. I 
stepped out in front of the desk, took off my glasses, 
and began at once without any preliminary "Ladies 
and gentlemen." I have never delivered "The Sunny 
Side of Life" any better than on that evening. I was 
master of the situation. Scores of people shook my 
hand at the close of the lecture and thanked me for an 
evening of rare delight and profit. I did not sleep 
much that night ! I was too happy. I sang and laughed 
and danced about my room almost the whole night 
long. I had triumphed, and I knew that I was in the 
right way; of a verity, I had found my place. 



Il6 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

"The Sunny Side of Life" has been delivered nearly 
one thousand times; it has been heard in thirty-four 
states and territories, and by more than a half million 
of people; three thousand hours of time have been 
consumed in the repetition of its words; it has been 
listened to in all sorts of auditoriums, from Tremont 
Temple in Boston to a room over a cow-stable in North 
Dakota; my scrap-books contain more than four 
thousand press comments concerning it; with but two 
exceptions all are in the highest sense complimentary 
to the last degree. The two which are not compli- 
mentary are as follows. After delivering it at Troy, 
O., the editor of a local newspaper said: "The lecturer 
of last night is evidently on the "Sonny" side of life 
himself ; when he gets out of his childhood he may be 
able to accomplish something of moment; his effort 
last night did him no credit." Comment is unnecessary,, 
except to state that I was thirty-three years old, and 
my life had had but little childhood in it. An editor 
of an Indiana journal in the town of Rushville said: 
"Dr. James Hedley delivered the third number of the 
course at the Opera House last night. His clothes 
fitted him beautifully ; he looks well behind footlights." 
That was all. I have never seen or heard its like since. 
The writer was no doubt thoroughly honest, and did 
the best he could. I was convinced of that after- 
ward, when some one informed me that before embark- 
ing in the business of running a newspaper he had 
been a tailor. For fully five years the average fee for 
m/ services remained about forty dollars. During the 
second five years I received an average of fifty dollars ; 
during the third five years I seldom lectured for less 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 117 

than sixty dollars, and for the past five years my fee 
has been uniformly seventy-five dollars, with an 
occasional compensation of one hundred dollars. 

During my connection with the Slayton Manage- 
ment I composed and delivered two other lectures, 
"Heroes and Heroism," the unwritten heroism of the 
common people, and "Failure and Success." These 
subjects have been delivered from three hundred to 
five hundred times. In the spring of 1883, I received 
a letter from the managers of the Redpath Lyceum 
Bureau, G. H. and F. W. Hathaway of Boston and 
Chicago, wishing to know if I would place the control 
and direction of my lecture tours in their hands. This 
I decided to do, and for seventeen years these excel- 
lent gentlemen arranged all my public appearances. 
During that time I made many triumphs, and on the 
whole did the best work of my life. I can never forget 
the skill, wise business judgment and kindness of 
these managers; they have been more than men of 
business to me, they have been friends. Considerate, 
capable and honorable to the last degree, they hold a 
first place in the Lyceum System of the country, and 
have won a corner in the inner sanctuary of my heart, 
warm and abiding. Under their direction the people 
•of America have been privileged to hear the greatest 
literary, scientific and musical celebrities of the world. 
By their efforts the Lyceum Platform has been lifted 
to the highest plane. The cultivated audiences of our 
country owe to them a debt of gratitude which can 
never be wholly repaid. It is to their courage and wise 
choosing that the American people are indebted for the 
presence and service of Phillips, Gough, Mrs. Liver- 



Il8 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

more, William Parsons, Anna Dickinson, Matthew 
Arnold, Wilkie Collins, Nansen, Dr. Holland, George 
William Curtis, Amelia Edwards, Russell H. Con- 
well, Robert J. Burdette, Bayard Taylor, Dr. Kane, 
Bishop Vincent, A. A. Willetts, George R. Wendling, 
Talmage, Prof. DeMotte, Robert Mclntyre, Camilla 
Urso, Carl Rosa, Emma Juch, and many others. 
Surely they have been the people's benefactors. At 
the present writing, in the years 1901-2, my profes- 
sional services are under the control of the Central 
Lyceum Bureau of Rochester, N. Y. The managers of 
this agency, H. H. Rich and S. B. Hershey, are men of 
long experience, progressive methods, and shrewd 
business judgment; they are in touch with the spirit 
and need of the times, and honorable withal. I con- 
tracted with them for the delivery of one hundred and 
twenty lectures during the season of 1900 and 1901. 
My work in the South from the beginning has been 
under the able guidance of my old friends, R. C. and 
J. M. Coldwell,the proprietors of the Southern Lyceum 
Bureau of Louisville, Ky., the leading agency for that 
hospitable section of our country. Mr. S. B. Hershey,. 
of the Central Lyceum Bureau, is the faithful 
"Cerberus at the gate," and has charge of the many 
business interests of that organization; every contract 
must pass through his hands. He is not only a man of 
unusual business capacity, but a most estimable 
Christian gentleman. He began the serious business 
of life as a minister of the gospel of the Master. In 
1870 he was graduated with honor from Oberlin 
University, the historically famous Congregational 
College ; in 1874, from the Yale Divinity School ; for 



THE I,YCEUM PLATFORM. 119 

seven years was pastor of the Congregational Church 
of Danbury, Conn. ; for fourteen years he filled with 
honor the pulpit of the Congregational Church of 
Ashtabula, O. ; during his pastorate with the latter 
church he began in connection with church work the 
organization of lecture courses, at the same time filling 
every demand of his ministry; the lecture-course work 
grew under his methods and guidance to such dimen- 
sions that he was compelled to lay aside the duties of 
the pulpit, as it was impossible for him to carry on 
both departments of activity. He is the original 
founder of the Central Lyceum Bureau, and in 1893 
he formed a partnership with H. H. Rich, of Roches- 
ter, N. Y., himself a practical manager of wide 
experience. The work at first was confined to the 
States of Ohio and New York, and was comparatively 
modest in its scope ; it has grown from year to year to 
such an extent that the territory in which the Bureau 
now operates extends from the Atlantic Ocean to 
Colorado. Every State of the North between those 
points is handled, and during the season of 1900- 1 the 
lecture courses managed by the Bureau approximated 
one thousand in number, and included the names of 
many distinguished men and women among its 
oratorical and musical attractions. The clients and 
patrons of the "Central" come from all walks of life, 
and the good accomplished, not only in entertaining 
but uplifting the "common people" is inestimable. I 
have greatly enjoyed my own connection with it, and 
have found Messrs. Rich and Hershey to be competent, 
careful, high-minded and honorable men. 

During the years of my lyceum life I have prepared 



120 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

and delivered many lectures. Not all have been plat- 
form successes. A lecture which reads well in the 
study does not always "strike twelve" on the platform. 
It may be an admirable essay and yet lack the elements 
of an oration. In all, I have composed and experi- 
mented with twenty-three different subjects; of this 
number the following have been pronounced successes, 
and have earned national fame: "The Sunny Side of 
Life," "Wisdom's Jewelled Ring," "What is a Man 
Worth?" "The kingly 'No,'" "Heroes and Heroism," 
"Failure and Success," "Wanted — A Man," "Vaga- 
bondiana," and "Eloquence." All lecturers have their 
favorite themes ; mine are, "The Sunny Side of Life," 
"Wisdom's Jewelled Ring" and "What is a Man 
Worth?" with no uncertain fondness for "Heroes and 
Heroism" and "The "Kingly 'No.' " In all my work 
I endeavor to deal with human interests. I steer clear 
of technical topics, mooted questions of philosophy 
and all problematical themes. These would tend only 
to place the minds of my hearers in attitudes of antag- 
onism to my own, and defeat the end sought. I aim 
always to win first the affections of my audiences, next 
the reason, and lastly the conscience or will. Love is 
the central thought of all my work. When this central 
thought is wanting I fail of the best results because 
I lose sight of the highest good. Love opens the door 
of every human heart, turns the imagination to win- 
some things, and renders all character heroic and 
sacred. Looking at mankind through the eyes of love, 
we are optimists, and however much we may arraign 
human follies and frailties at the bar of honesty and 
justice, even to the everlasting condemnation of them, 



THE I^YCEUM PLATFORM. 121 

we can never lose sight of the eternal fact that no soul 
is ever wholly disfigured, no life an utter waste. Love 
exalts and points to the ideal in character ; it is lenient 
with the real ; it may accuse, but it forgives. It is not 
content with tearing down; its desire and its purpose 
is to build up. Love always sings the cheering song 
of better human possibilities. I have much of respect 
at least for the mere things of the intellect, and for 
the logic of argument, the reason of books, but these 
things alone are cold, sour, forbidding, because the 
factful records of the reasoner, or the observer and 
reporter of the hard details of life, its struggles and 
disappointments, its follies and crimes, its wretched 
philosophy of the things that are and of the inevitable 
are not comforting, not reassuring, not of the fabric 
of hope. Why not sing of the things that may be? 
Why not comfort with the hope of the tomorrow? 
Why not wake melodies upon the instruments of the 
better selves of mankind. With love present, goodness 
and beauty are everywhere. The meanest has within 
him the divinity of the elder Brother of us all. 

I always avoid making my lectures bookish. I do not 
fill them with leaves from my library. They do not 
smell of the encyclopedia. I have a good many books 
in my study, and they have profited me much, but my 
best library is the world, and my favorite books are 
the hearts of men and women and children. Somehow, 
I gravitate toward the lowly and the common; a 
laborer with a shovel, a mechanic homeward bound 
with his dinner pail, a boy in a ragged jacket, are all 
to me of nearer and dearer thought than are the com- 
manders of armies, the rulers of empires or the kings 



[22 TWENTY YEARS ON THE EECTURE PLATFORM. 

of wealth and power. I love the "under dog in the 
fight," and am his champion though at times he may 
err. I prefer heart to art, love character rather than 
reputation, have more reverence for a little under- 
standing than for much knowledge, and believe that 
truth with love are the eternal verities. 

I have a little book in my library by Nathan Shep- 
pard entitled "Before An Audience." I have read it 
with much pleasure; it voices much of my own belief 
and mirrors much of my own experience. It is a 
valuable book for those who have pulpit or platform 
ambitions. In Mr. Sheppard's talk about audiences, he 
insists that the observation and study of an audience is 
essential to the speaker's success. In that way alone 
can he ascertain its opinion concerning him. He notes 
that it is necessary for a speaker to read the faces of 
his hearers in order to achieve the best results. My 
own experience does not support this claim. I am 
afflicted with near-sightedness to such a degree that 
without the aid of glasses it is impossible for me to 
clearly distinguish an object at a distance of eight feet. 
To be able to see and read the faces of an audience is 
for me a physical impossibility, because while speak- 
ing I always discard my glasses ; they rob the coun- 
tenance of much of its expressiveness, and deprive a 
spreaker of the peculiar power which the eyes exert. 

To me, the inability to discern the faces of my 
hearers is a blessing, and indeed an aid to the highest 
success. My organization is of such a sensitive qual- 
ity, that any inattention or disapproval would not only 
give me pain, but would so disconcert me that beyond 
question I should break down. I remain blissfully ig- 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 1 23 

norant of everything which might have a tendency to 
disturb the progress of my labor, or in any way upset 
my equanimity. Late comers have no terrors for me. 
Men may come, and men may go, but like Tennyson's 
brook, "I go on forever." The twitchings of Miss 
Fuss-and-Fidget have no terrors for me, and do not 
ruffle the serenity of my mind. If my utterances pro- 
duce a contortion of her features, such as to imply an 
attack of the colic, I do not know it. I am utterly ob- 
livious to the tip-tilted nose of my Lady Disdain. Lov- 
ers may spoon; the phlegmatic may sleep, and the 
chewers of gum may manipulate that dainty cud with 
all the contented enjoyment of a cow in a meadow of 
clover — it is all the same to me. I am the one fortu- 
nate and happy lecturer of the world. I am not on the 
platform to see, but to be seen. No listener has ever 
discovered my lack of visual discernment. To my au- 
diences, I seem to be able to see, and surely that is suf- 
ficient. A lady once said to me, "You have the most 
wonderful control of your eyes I ever saw ; I tried my 
best to-night to look you out of countenance, but 
failed/' My eyes have been called "magnetic, dra- 
matic, psychologic," and all that sort of thing. Using 
no glasses, it would be impossible for me to use manu- 
script; another blessing. I do not enjoy a reader of 
manuscript, and I know that audiences do not; they 
want a speaker to lecture, not to read ; notes are a hin- 
drance; they break in upon the continuity of any ef- 
fort, and stand in the way of the highest oratorical 
effects. I once heard Edward Everett, who always 
had his manuscript at hand for reference if necessary. 
He was describing the flight of some wild pigeons 



124 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

through a wood; suddenly, the speaker paused; the 
flight was interrupted; the rustle and whir of wings 
ceased; Mr. Everett was compelled to look through 
his manuscript for the forgotten sentence before the 
pigeons could proceed; it marred utterly what would 
otherwise have been a beautiful picture. I use no man- 
uscript ; my verbal memory fortunately is of the best, 
and besides, I am able to think on my feet and can 
improvise when memory fails. 

In my work, I have always been encouraged by 
words of cheer and appreciation from many distin- 
guished men and women. In January, 1885, I made 
my first appearance in a town of classic New England. 
I was anxious as to my success in that section. I had 
been told that New England people were cold, and not 
given to any expression of pleasure, even though it 
might have been given them. All this erroneous re- 
port was set at naught as soon as I had appeared. After 
my lecture at Bradford, N. H., Hon. Mason W. Tap- 
pan, Attorney-General of the State of New Hamp- 
shire, wrote : 

''I had the pleasure last evening of listening to your 
eloquent lecture on 'The sunny side of life/ delivered 
in the Baptist Church, and I was so much interested, 
both in the manner and matter of the lecture, that I 
take this way of thanking you for a very delightful 
evening's entertainment. I think no lecture in our 
course this winter has given so much general satisfac- 
tion. It was replete with good sense and genuine hu- 
mor, taking a cheery view of life. The anecdotes and 
illustrations were so apt and telling, that they never 
failed to bring down the house. Wishing you great 
success in the lecture field, I am, very respectfully, 
Your Obed't Servant, 

Mason W. Tappan." 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 1 25 

I have always greatly enjoyed New England audi- 
ences. They always give one an honest verdict. New 
England people are a people of reason; they are not 
blinded by mere sentimentalities. What a history is 
theirs, and how they have blessed this land of ours ! 
Sturdy, honorable, just and chaste, they have always 
been a people of universal sobriety and health, the chief 
elements of happiness. The years of their lives are 
calm and many. In mental capacity, physical courage 
and moral uprightness, they are giants. In the halls 
of debate, and upon fields of battle, they have always 
been triumphant. Every New England family is rep- 
resented to-day in this land by an average of a thou- 
sand souls of its own blood, and this blood, the leaven 
of the intellectual and moral life of this nation, flows 
in the veins of twenty million people. I am indebted 
to Hon. William Lawrence, of Ohio, once Comptroller 
of the Treasury of the United States ; to William Cox, 
the gifted merchant-scholar of Rochester, N. Y., whose 
"Science of Understanding," based upon the writings 
of Homer, has given him an exalted place among the 
philosophic thinkers of the world; to Mr. Walter 
Hughson, of New York City, prominent in the work 
of the Young Men's Christian Association; to S. M. 
Spedon, editor of "Talent," writer and entertainer 
whose inimitable "chalk-talks" are widely known and 
sought after; to Maj. Charles H. Smith, the famous 
"Bill Arp" of Southern humor, that delightful soul, in 
whose hospitable home I have passed many happy 
hours ; to Hon. Allen Warden of Wisconsin, and later 
of Missouri; to Edmund J. Burke, the gifted imper- 
sonator, and portrait painter of Rochester, N. Y. ; and 



126 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

to Hudson H. Burr, of Cedar Rapids, la., my friend of 
many years; how many welcome taps at the door of 
memory I hear,_at the thought of his name! and to 
many other friends for that encouragement and coun- 
sel which has enabled me to stand my ground and win 
my way, often when the outlook seemed dark indeed. 
I have been the recipient of the cheer and faith of 
my brethren of the Lyceum Platform to a marked de- 
gree. Early in my career Hon. George R. Wendling 
wrote: "I have followed you in many places during 
the past year. Everywhere I have heard the highest 
praise of your work. Go on ; you are bound to suc- 
ceed. God bless and prosper you, and bring your ship 
into a peaceful haven." Russell H. Conwell, that 
giant of Philadelphia, who has known the pain and 
pleasure of trial and triumph, wrote: "I am always 
glad to commend you everywhere, because I know you 
never fail to give even more than people ask." I have 
in old scrap-books hundreds of letters from all sorts 
and conditions of men and women, all breathing sym- 
pathy, love and blessing. How good this world is! 
What splendid souls walk the fields of this life ! 
Heaven cannot fail to be a place of supremest bliss, 
when such as these get there. In my study hangs the 
portrait of dear Robert J. Burdette. Burdette, whose 
philosophy of life is as sweet and as full of benedic- 
tion as the gentle words of Abou Ben Adhem, who 
went first into the Heavenly country because he loved 
his fellow-men ; at the tap of his merry finger, every 
heart opens wide to let him in ; the prince of the philo- 
sophic jesters of any time! How many and beautiful 
the words of commendation he has said for me up and 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 1 27 

down the land ! How like the blessing of the rain to 
the parched grass it is to receive a letter from his 
kindly bountiful pen! Here is one from his home at 
Robinsnest, near Bryn Mawr : 

"Dear Dr. Hedley: — Your cheery and ever so wel- 
come letter of January sixth would have been answered 
six months ago, (the date of this letter is March four- 
teenth) but — well — I've quit lying, so I won't make 
the excuse I was going to. As a Pullman porter once 
remarked to me when "second seventy-two had lost 
her right of way, and was trying to run on extra 
fourteen's time, and had got chucked into a gravel pit 
by a wood train running wild, 'Predestination is de 
thief of time.' " I am getting ready to go to California 
where SHE is waiting for me. (Mr. Burdette was 
about to be married.) I have a thousand things to 
do to-day, two thousand tomorrow, and everything 
on earth the next day; and the day after that, I begin 
all over again. So you see ? I can't half answer your 
dearly prized letter, (which I have sent to her, by the 
way.) How fortunate you are, that you can spell 
well enough to use a type-writer! Whenever I use 
mine, I have to print at the bottom, — "Dictated 
Letter" to conceal my crimes. But I was afraid I 
couldn't fool you that way. A thousand thanks for 
your letter ! Come out to Pasadena and see me. 
Always your friend, 

Robert J. Burdette." 

A letter which I prize as highly as any in my pos- 
session is from that genial comforter and lover of 
mankind, Dr. A. A. Willetts. It reveals the soul of 



128 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

its author. It bears the date of January, 1893. Dr. 
Willetts delivers a lecture called "Sunshine, the 
secret of a happy life." It was never my happy for- 
tune to hear it. His "Sunshine," and my "Sunny 
Side" were both given in the great lecture course of 
Boston in Tremont Temple. I preceded him. In my 
lecture, I told a story of a German soldier who after 
being flogged for a misdemeanor, laughed riotously, 
and when questioned for the reason of his laughter, 
replied, "You haf peen licking the wrong man !" Dr. 
Willitts in his lecture told a similar story about a 
schoolboy. His story did not "take" as we say. The 
good doctor was troubled about it. Some dyspeptic 
individual took ocasion to comfort him, by saying 
"Hedley told that, and took the wind out of your 
sails. He is going about the country with all your 
good things. He has stolen the best of your lecture." 
This came to my notice and I frankly wrote Dr. 
Willitts about it. I assured him that at no time had 
I ever heard him upon the platform, nor did I know 
that any story of his was similar to mine. I further 
assured him that if his story was dear to him, I would 
never again repeat mine, but gave him exclusive right 
and title in the premises. I told him of the good words 
said of his splendid work, and wished he might be 
able to gather all the world together in some great 
auditorium, like to the valley of the Yellowstone Park, 
and at the hour of sunset, speak his message as a last 
"goodnight to earth" before he died. His letter in 
reply was as follows : 

"My Dear Dr. Hedley: I am very much obliged 
to you for your letter. Some eight or ten years ago» 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 1 29 

some man in central Ohio said to me — 'Do you know 
Dr. Hedley has got up a lecture on " 'The sunny side 
of life' " and has got lots of your " 'Sunshine' " lecture 
in it ?' Well, I smiled and did not make any reply. At 
the close of my lecture in the 'Star Course' (Boston) 
a gentleman came up and said 'First-rate, Doctor! 
Capital ! Everything in it new, except one story.' 
'What was that?' 'Whipping the wrong school-boy.' 
'Where did you ever hear that?' 'Why, Dr. Hedley 
gave us that?' 'Well, all I have to say is Hedley 
borrowed it from my lecture without giving me proper 
credit for it. The story I tell I dramatized from an 
incident I heard twenty years ago, and the whole 
drapery and dramatic action is my own conceit, and I 
did feel as if I had a professional patent on it. I felt 
that a brother lecturer who having heard me give it, 
and then used it himself, should say 'Willetts tells a 
good story, etc.,' as I have often in repeating a story 
of Gough's or Beecher's. When I lectured at Cam- 
bridgeport the other night, an old friend who had 
heard me twenty years before, said, 'Why did you not 
give us that capital thing about whipping the wrong 
school boy?' I replied, T don't give that any more — 
Dr. Hedley has monopolized that. I don't tell it for 
fear they will say I stole it from Hedley.' Now your 
letter sets me right on two points in which I was mis- 
taken: Firstly, that you never heard my lecture on 
"Sunshine;" Second, that your story and mine are 
totally different, except in a single point — the wrong 
person whipped ! So I am very glad to be set straight 
and shall never again make the charge of plagiarism 
against you. I try to love all men; to feel well and 



I30 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

speak well of my brother lecturers. Indeed 'good- 
will to men' is a part of my creed, and I have rarely 
had cause to feel otherwise. Dear Doctor, I again 
thank you for your kind letter, and give you my hand, 
and say 'God Bless you V May He always help you to 
show men how to find the 'sunny side of life,' and that 
behind all the clouds the sun still shines, and it is only 
a question of time before He will show His bright face, 
and if they will face the sun, the shadows will always 
be behind them. Very truly yours, 

A. A. Willitts." 

Verily that "whipped boy" builded better than he 
knew. He made for me a friend of purest gold. Dear 
old Willitts! Over seventy years have whitened his 
hair at this writing, and still he dispenses as sweetly 
as of old his gospel of beneficence. Dear sunny soul, 
with the odor of the May-time about him, and the 
warmth of June in his heart. His eyes are full of 
laughter. His mouth is like a child's, so sweet is it, 
and so frank. He is worthy to be called by that 
sweetest name ever given to the Carpenter of Naza- 
reth; he should be called "The Comforter." He has 
filled the pulpits of some of the great churches of the 
land, and he always preached the same gospel, the 
gospel of comfort. That is his creed. He has brought 
that creed to the platform, and whether he talks on 
"Sunshine/' or on "The model wife," his message is 
always the same. It is to make the rougn paths of 
life smooth, to bring roses back to white cheeks, and 
to attune the broken voices of the suffering to laugh- 
ter's key. He was in his prime when Phillips and 
Beecher and Gough were comparatively young; he is 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I3I 

still in his prime. I do not believe the fountain of 
immortal youth is down in Florida — it is in the heart 
of A. A. Willitts. 

Whenever I find that Dr. Willitts has been an- 
nounced to deliver his "Sunshine" in a course in which 
I am to appear, I always insist upon giving "Wisdom's 
jewelled ring/' or "What is a man worth?" that he 
may have full course to run and be glorified. I wish 
he might live seventy years longer. I wish he might 
always live. He will, too; and that on earth, for the 
world can never forget him. 

Far above all friends who have cheered and 
strengthened me, stands one apart and alone from all 
the rest. That friend is a woman. She has made pos- 
sible for me a place from which when going, I weep, 
and to which returning, I laugh as with the laughter 
of angels ; a place to which my children bring the first 
wild flowers of Spring; a place where affection lights 
as with the splendor of morning door-step and window 
and fire-side; a place that sorrow has hallowed and 
joy blest as with a benediction; a place where when 
men forsake me and doubt me, faith still abides, and 
the heart still hopes; no painter can do it justice, no 
poet can sing a song worthy of it, and no philosopher 
can explain the meaning of its power, its uplifting, 
and its salvation; the place is Home, and the 
Woman is Mary my wife, who has made it pos- 
sible. When the tempest rages, and the ship of life 
is all but overwhelmed by wind and wave, there is no 
anchor like home, and no pilot like a good wife. After 
all, home and wife and children pull hardest at the 
heart-strings, and are the strongest incentive to brave 



I32 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

endeavor and high achievement. These have given 
me strength and courage and hope, and have recon- 
ciled me to the many hardships and self-denials of the 
serious business of a travelling lecturer's life. And 
it is serious business; it is hard work. The lecturer 
is very much a vagabond; he wanders about from 
place to place, homeless and for the most part friend- 
less and alone. Miles of weary travel, wretched meals 
and fireless rooms in bad hotels, and the discomforts 
and exposures incident to the cold dark days and nights 
of winter, the time when he is most in demand, are 
all a part of his regular bill-of-fare. He must have 
nerves of steel, and the self-control of an angel of the 
better country to stand the wear and grind of it all. 
The lecturer journeys more miles in a season than 
any commercial traveller. I have averaged more miles 
each year for the past twenty years than are required 
to girdle the earth's circumference. All sorts of con- 
veyances have been pressed into service to enable me 
to "get there;" — limited express trains, local passen- 
gers, palace cars, and freight cars; trains by day and 
by night; steamboats, hand-ferries, row-boats, and 
rafts; omnibuses, carriages, wagons, sleighs, buck- 
boards and drays. I have walked five miles in mud 
and water above my shoe-tops, and once poled through 
floating ice in the Illinois River. When connections 
have been missed, because of accident or delay, I have 
ridden at the rate of a mile a minute, for forty miles, 
and gone to the platform unwashed and unfed. Often, 
when behind time, I have made my toilet for the 
evening in the smoking compartments of sleeping 
cars, and behind piles of trunks in baggage cars. At 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I33 

two and three o'clock in the morning, I have carried 
. my heavy satchel through sleet and rain three and 
even four miles miles to a railroad depot, and there 
waited in fireless rooms, or out in the cold and storm 
for my train which was an hour or more behind time. 
I had such an experience some twelve years since at 
a station in Iowa; the train was late, and the railroad 
waiting room was devoid of light or fire ; the mercury 
stood at thirteen degrees below zero; I thought I 
should freeze to death, and verily believe I should 
have done so, had not the track-walker, making his 
nightly round found me, and taken me to his cabin, 
where I was warmed at his fire, and refreshed with 
a strong cup of coffee which he had his "ould woman" 
get up and make for me. I shall never forget that 
dear "ould woman." 

I have lectured before white people, black people 
and red people ; for the "upper ten," and the "lower ten 
thousand ;" for collegians and cow-boys ; for ministers 
and miners; litterateurs and lunatics; for saints in 
the house of God, and sinners in penitentiaries. I 
remember I was in doubt about my penitentiary audi- 
ence, and said to the warden, "Do you suppose your 
people will appreciate what I may have to say?" 

"Certainly," he replied, "you will find plenty of 
brains here; it takes brains to get into the peniten- 
tiary; if men would use half the brains to keep out 
of the penitentiary that they do to get in, it would be 
a very lonesome place!" 

I was somewhat reassured. I should at least have 
the kind of appreciation that brains can give. Had 
the warden told me that I should find hearts there, love 



134 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

inspired, and consciences on guard at the gate of the 
soul, I should have felt still better, but of course he 
could not tell me that. This incident forced in upon me 
the conviction that, after all, we need something more 
than brains to be men, something more than intellect, 
and I remembered that Cardinal Angelo had intellect, 
but it did not keep him from stealing corn. I remem- 
bered that the most magnificently intellectual age in 
Italian history was that under the reign of the great 
Lorenzo, and yet there never was a time in the life of 
Italy, when men and women, and even boys and girls 
were quite so low and vile and morally lost as then, 
and it was the sin and the shame of that time which 
called forth the thunders of the righteous wrath of 
brave Savonarola. 

The Lyceum Platform is an institution ; it is a force 
in the land ; it has a mission. Whatever tends toward 
the intellectual and moral enrichment of a community 
is a power for good. Give this power a permanent 
form by organization, and the result is an institution. 
With the high needs of the common people in mind, 
with an unvarying purpose to reach the minds, hearts 
and above all the consciences of men and women, and 
to turn them toward the contemplation of right things, 
particularly with a view toward heeding and living 
such right things, a force is established the value of 
which is inestimable. Among the permanent institu- 
tions for the advancement of humanity, the Lyceum 
Platform holds a first place. It stands side by side 
with the church, the moral club and the Christian 
associations of the time as a magnet to draw the people 
from the low levels of the commonplace, the mean 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I35 

and the degrading to the heights where pure thoughts, 
sweet emotions and spiritual convictions dwell, and 
where human possibilities for the best in life are at 
once evident and helpful. 

The Lyceum Platform from its infancy has been 
one of the world's evangels. It has had its teachers, 
heroes, apostles, and prophets, — as much so as the 
church. The words of Garrison, Greeley, Thomas 
Starr King and Beecher were as potent in the liber- 
ation of the black man from the chains of slavery as 
any other power that can be named, and these words 
were spoken in the lecture courses of the land. John 
B. Gough, whose sublime gifts were as a divine reve- 
lation, consecrated a work of forty years to the redemp- 
tion of humanity from the bondage of intemperance, 
and the Lyceum Platform was the medium through 
which he labored. All great questions of social as 
well as political and moral reform have found oppor- 
tunity for utterance through the lecture course as an 
institution, and by means of it mankind have been 
drawn nearer the hope and the will of the Master. 

To-day the Lyceum Platform is doing marvellous 
work throughout the length and breadth of our coun- 
try, in molding the minds and hearts of the people, 
and fixing them upon the heights of the "delectable 
mountains" where all that is best and brightest of 
moral human beauty shines, as shines the sun. Count- 
less thousands have been profited by the lyceum of old 
Salem, Massachusetts, during the seventy years of its 
existence. With the coming season, the lyceum of 
Poughkeepsie, N. Y., will enter upon the fiftieth year 
of its grand work. For more than forty years Sing 



I36 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Sing, N. Y., under the shadow of penitentiary walls, 
has thundered the diapason of truth and wisdom 
through its lecture course. Camden, N. J., for ten 
years has so shaped the finer convictions of men that 
the nights of the lyceum draw out a thousand hearers, 
in spite of theaters and dances and dime museums in 
the city over the Delaware River. Elkhart, Indiana, 
began a lecture course seventeen years ago, in the face 
of prejudice and adverse popular opinion. The city 
was known as a "show town," and the people were 
flooded with an avalanche of coarse, unprofitable and 
even immoral entertainments. Hard-working men 
and women spent their money for that which gave 
them nothing beneficial, and which filled the minds of 
their children with morbid thoughts and degraded 
tastes. At first, the new force struggled for life, 
but it kept on and on, until the cheap "show-man" 
began to omit Elkhart, as it "did not pay," and the 
people at last said, "Our money and our time shall be 
given to better things." Hundreds of listeners 
crowded the largest auditorium to get the results of 
the ripe scholarship, the wise suggestion, and the moral 
uplift, as well as the entertainment of the lecturers 
who gave of their best to benefit and delight. Many 
who do not go to church will attend a lecture, and 
that attendance is frequently the open door for them 
into God's house thereafter. Many whose financial 
means are inadequate to the purchase of books are 
given a liberal education by means of the lyceum. 
Horace Mann, that prince of teachers, said: "The 
lyceum is the people's college, the larger pulpit, and 
the noblest platform reform has ever had." Many 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 137 

toiling, struggling young men and women in the 
schools and colleges of our land are lifted out of the 
'"slough of despond," and inspired to renewed effort 
by the messages of sweet cheer heard from the plat- 
form. 

There can be no question as to the power, the mis- 
sion of the Lyceum Platform. It is a leaven of good 
in every community wherever introduced, and upon 
that fact rests its paramount claim to the support of 
the people. It meets a want and fills a place that 
nothing elese can do. All that is best in literature, 
art, science and practical religion is within its domain. 
By virtue of its magnificent past, its strong and health- 
ful present, and the wider possibilities of its future, 
it has a hold upon the affections of humanity which 
is as the hold of a giant, and in the grasp of its power, 
which, however firm, is always kindly, always loving, 
the intellectually weak and the morally lame are made 
strong and enabled to walk with uprightness. 

Occasionally, some ill-advised newspaper insists 
that the platform is declining, and that the day of the 
lecturer is passing away. Last season, there were 
more lectures delivered throughout the country, than 
at any previous time, in all, some six thousand. There 
can be no such thing as the decline of the platform. 
Lecturers and lecturing will no more pass away than 
will the practice of medicine, or law, or preaching or 
teaching, or the editing of newspapers. Some lectur- 
ers go out and are forgotten, but lecturing remains 
and will continue to remain as long as time itself 
endures. Public speaking is an indestructible branch 
of industry. The announcement of a great speaker 



138 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

will command a crowded hearing, just as it ever has, 
from the time of the talks of Jesus, up to the last 
address in Boston, or New York, or Jonesville or 
Smith-town. The lecture is the foundation of the. 
university, and the university still rests upon it. 
"Popular lecturing" is far more pleasing and satisfac- 
tory than "university extension lecturing." It is less 
given to technicalities, obscure reference, and the one- 
sided enthusiasms of specialists, who are often narrow 
of vision. 

There is an entertainment side to the present-day 
platform, which doubtless in time will decline. Just 
now, it is at its height, and savors somewhat of the 
character of the vaudeville, or "variety show." Cer- 
tain "managers," anxious to fill their pockets with 
lucre, are given to speculation with light and some- 
what frivolous performances. The people are some- 
times taken and done for by such so-called "combi- 
nations" as the "Pretzo-Lagerian Trio of Yudlers, 
from the Yudel-vaal, near Skinsinnoti ;" "Salmo- 
Semaj, the Seventh Son of the Seven Stars, the Orien- 
tal Conjurer," who scatters the ace of spades, the 
queen of clubs, and the jack of diamonds all over the 
sacred desk of the house of God, mystifying the Philis- 
tines, and shocking the godly; but these do not 
represent the Lyceum, form no part of it, and 
in the nature of things cannot last. There is 
an entertainment side to the lyceum, however, 
which is wholesome and clean in character, and 
therefore thoroughly acceptable. In my own work, I 
have given considerable attention to entertainment. If 
people are entertained, they give attention; attention 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 139 

being gained, it is easy to instruct, inspire and benefit. 
Audiences delight in illustration; abstract reasoning 
will fail frequently where a picture, a dramatic inci- 
dent, a story, or even a song, will achieve the end 
desired. To hold and move and convince all classes, 
the lecture must be a piece of mosaic ; a thing of fact 
and fancy, humor and pathos, sense and sentiment, 
fable and moral. My creations of "Lillian Addlepate 
Tattlewit at the Piano," "Patsy and Mike," "The 
morning-glory," "Texas Courtship," "Mrs. Blunder- 
buss Bang's Pink and White Tea," "Ruby and Sandy," 
"Fortunatus Bagg's Musicale," "Dicky Weaver to the 
Miners," "Professional Church Choir," "Slumber 
Song," and other children of my fancy, have done as 
much to fix the minds and hearts of my listeners upon 
earnest and honest things as any effort of logic, or 
burst of eloquence. 

There is much of charm in the better concerts and 
readings which come before the people, and yet even 
these are not vital to the life of the platform. It is 
pleasant to hear music at a dinner, but the music 
neither adds to nor takes from the dinner; the bread 
and beef are the real things, and they remain the same. 
Pictures are acceptable in a book, especially to chil- 
dren, but the argument of the book, after all, is the 
soul of it, and only souls are immortal. If the pro- 
ducing "managers," who provide the entertainment 
side of the lyceum are wise, they will not misinterpret 
the wants of the people to the hurt of the lyceum idea. 
In the theater world, managers frequently attempt to 
justify the production of certain performances by the 
plea: "We must give the people what they want." 



140 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

This plea is both weak and false. The great majority 
of men and women want what they need. Whatever 
tends to elevate, instruct, inspire and delight, is the 
need and want of the time. Only that can delight 
which is beautiful, and that alone is beautiful which 
is pure, refined and true ; herein is the only good. 

It must not be understood that there is any lessening 
of the former high standards of the Lyceum Platform, 
in its distinctive domain, in the intellectual, social or 
moral life of our country. To concede that would be 
to impeach the intelligence and the conscience of not 
only those who speak from it, but of those who make 
up its audiences. He must be very much of a cynic, 
a, pessimist, or a mental dyspeptic, who connot dis- 
cern the hopeful strength of the messages which 
emanate from the present-day platform, and the 
healthful quality of the food provided for sound intel- 
lectual digestion. The character of an institution 
depends upon the quality of its component parts. The 
character of the platform, whether high or low, is 
necessarily a reflex of the character of its lecturers. 
Lecturer and lyceum are synonymous. The intellectual 
and moral strength of the one implies the intellectual 
and moral strength of the other. What appreciable 
difference can any fair-minded critic point out and 
conclusively establish, between the "giants of those 
days" and the giants of these days? Many of the 
strong thinkers of the time, the representative men of 
our country, are on the platform. Are they mental 
weaklings or moral degenerates? If so, why do 
thoughtful and refined people crowd to hear them? 
Why is it that lecture courses have increased to an 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I4X 

extent that is approximately phenomenal? Between 
thirty and forty years ago, each winter provided about 
one hundred lecture courses throughout the country. 
Last season, (1899- 1900) the lyceum courses num- 
bered nearly one thousand. The patrons approached 
in round numbers three-quarters of a million. Surely 
they were not drawn together to give ear and mind 
and heart wholly to themes of a light and frivolous 
character. The chief supporters of the lyceum of 
to-day come from the colleges and schools of the 
country, from the literary and social clubs, the Young 
Men's Christian Associations, the Christian Endeavor 
Societies, and from the thoughtful, earnest hosts of 
the common people. There never was a time when the 
masses were so eager to hear and know as now. Was. 
it to provide the thin arrow-root tea of mental nurs- 
lings that the White Fund of Lawrence, Massachu- 
setts, the Ames Fund of North Easton, Massachu- 
setts, the Peabody Fund of Danvers, Massachusetts, 
the Merrill Fund of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, the Jordan 
Fund of Columbus, Georgia, and a score of others I 
might name, were established? Did these philan- 
thropists discover that the Lyceum Platform had 
degenerated and because of that degeneracy, decide to 
devote countless thousands of dollars to its main- 
tenace ? It may be admitted that in one particular, the 
vital thought of the platform has changed, and that 
change exists because the condition which made that 
particular vital thought possible has disappeared. It 
has been swept away by the besom of carnage upon 
blood-stained battle-fields. That one vital thought 
grew out of the existence of slavery. Do those who 



142 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

extol the fire of the platform utterances of former 
times, desire a renewal of the same sort of fire ? Then 
must slavery come again. May the peace of earth, 
and the love of heaven forbid ! 

Did it ever occur to the complainers that the themes 
of the Lyceum Platform of thirty and forty years 
ago, which are preserved as oratorical classics, are 
along other lines than that of the "irrepressible con- 
flict?" When we call to mind the greatest platform 
achievement of Wendell Phillips, the prince of the 
anti-slavery agitators, it is not some utterance for 
liberty; it is his lecture entitled "The Lost Arts." 
That was very largely a dose of medicine for our 
somewhat common American disease, egotism; how 
he took the conceit out of us with its forests of for- 
gotten facts? When he had finished, we knew that 
we were not the only people of the earth who had 
discovered, invented and accomplished wonders. The 
fame of Henry Ward Beecher was established by his 
lectures on "The Beautiful," and "The Ministry of 
Wealth." Thomas Starr King's greatest lyceum effort 
was his lecture entitled "Substance and Show ;" simple 
men of common sense after hearing it, used to say 
"Gracious, but them's idees!" Emerson was at his 
best in his series of talks on "Representative Men." 
These subjects were all delivered from the old Essex 
Lyceum platform, and were the gems of its earlier 
history. 

What of the men and the subjects of to-day? 
Beecher and Chapin and Starr King are gone, but 
magnificent Conwell and Talmage, and splendid 
Dixon, and the prose-poet Mclntyre, and William H. 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 143 

Crawford, who has followed in the footsteps of Huss 
and Wycliff, that he might speak with authority of 
them; Gunsaullus and Hillis, and delightful Willitts, 
and the almost omniscient DeWitt Miller, strong, 
factful and tactful, remain, and so long as intelligence 
endures, and the ability to receive, understand and 
profit by noble utterances abides, will the themes of 
these men, — such themes as "Acres of Diamonds," 
"Backbone," "Buttoned-up People," "A chapter in the 
history of Liberty," "The Stranger at our Gates," and 
"Sunshine," — impress, uplift, strengthen and bless the 
multitudes who gather to hear them to-day, and in as 
great measure as any utterances of the earlier time. 

The studied art and finished grace of Edward 
Everett may have charmed, although he fell short of 
the highest eloquence, but these same qualities are no 
less apparent in the work of Mr. Wendling, who by 
virtue of his tremendous earnestness is the greater 
orator, while the moral value of his utterances go far 
beyond anything of Mr. Everett's best; Mr. Everett's 
lecture on "Washington" fell far below the heights 
attained by Mr. Wendling in his "Saul of Tarsus," 
and his "Man of Galilee;" Edward Everett was too 
conservative, too much a slave to his conception of the 
artistic and fit, to reach the Olympian summits of 
eloquent greatness. He was too anxious to be right, 
as the majority saw right. He was an apologetic 
trimmer. True he walked in the quiet valleys, and by 
the sweetly murmuring brooks of speech ; he gathered 
the flowers of language, and weaved them into gar- 
lands of myriad and beautiful colors ; listeners admired, 
but were not moved by him. He knew not the torrent, 



144 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

the avalanche. He could pipe melodiously, but he 
could not thunder. His silvery veins of reflection 
were dug with a golden spade, but with him, the grind- 
ing of the "mills of the gods" was an unknown 
quantity. He was an oratorical Beau Brummel, and 
his attitudes and gestures suggested rehearsals before 
a full-length mirror. His physical presence was 
impressive, and yet his orations failed to impress. His 
address on "Washington" was the highest possible 
exhibition of the evolution of the school-boy decla- 
mation. It did not build the monument to Washing- 
ton. The cause and not the declaimer built it. Love 
of the Father of his Country, in the hearts of a grate- 
ful people was the motive power which opened purses. 
Had the subject been a eulogy of John Smith, it would 
not have touched one generous heart, but with Henry 
Clay as the orator, the people would have said, "We do 
not know John Smith, but here is our money!" 

Dr. Holland and James T. Fields did good work in 
the old days, but Bain, of Kentucky, and Lorimer, of 
Boston, do better work in these days. John G. Saxe 
used to succeed moderately well in spite of a faulty 
delivery, in finding the humorous part of the gray 
matter of the brains of those who heard him, but 
neither his matter nor his manner would be acceptable 
to the multitudes whose lips have smiled, eyes moist- 
ened and hearts kept time to the mirth, the pathos, and 
the love-laden music of James Whitcomb Riley. Josh 
Billings managed to voice, though somewhat hoarsely, 
a sort of semi- Solomonic wisdom, through the medium 
of his mangled English, — lo, these many years ago, — 
but there is a little man on the platform to-day, whose 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 1 45 

philosophy of life is as sweet and as full of benediction 
as were the loving words of the Master ; what he has to 
say is couched in upright English, his words have no 
"bad spells ;" this little man is the king of the ethical 
and philosophical jesters of the Courts of the World, — 
he is Robert J. Burdette. 

The Lyceum Platform thirty and forty years ago, 
could boast of perhaps a score of thinkers, some of 
whom were orators; they served well their day and 
generation ; products of the "form and pressure of the 
time/' they met its requirements, and left behind them 
evidences of work nobly done, and no man can say the 
memory of them shall perish. In the words of Tiny 
Tim, "God bless them, every one!" 

Through the medium of the platform to-day, the 
people are afforded glimpses of the great literary 
authors of the English-speaking world, and while with 
here and there an exception, as in the case of Charles 
Dickens, they are neither orators nor elocutionists, and 
not often entertainers in the popular sense, they serve 
to fix the minds of the masses upon that order of books 
which not only delight but do them good. There are 
too many books which work the moral if not the intel- 
lectual undoing of those who read them, but the 
Lyceum Platform has never been accessible to the 
writers of them. To all such, the platform has ever 
remained a closed door. 

It is true that from time to time we have had visits 
from famous Englishmen, whose platform utterances 
have not been "blessings in disguise/' or at least, they 
have been so thoroughly disguised that we have failed 
to discover them. Matthew Arnold in his lecture on 



146 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

"Numbers," tried to destroy our time-honored and 
sacred reverence for the faith in the wisdom and 
safety of the "will of the majority;" he comforted (?) 
us much with the assurance that so long as we had in 
our midst "an intellectually and morally well-balanced 
remnant, or minority, whose blood was distinctively 
English," we might hope to endure as a Republic, and 
in some way come out in the end, a reasonably 
judicious and happy nation. Charles Kingsley came 
to view our country with a "critic's eye," and to 
gather in our honest Yankee dollars. Once we loved 
Charles Kingsley, but our love had vanished at the 
time of his visit. It had been murdered by his own 
hand. There is much discussion at the present hour, 
as whether we of America do, or do not hate England 
and everything English. Goldwin Smith has insisted 
that we do. Professor Tyndall was disposed to think 
that we do not. As for myself, born in England, and 
driven by the hand of poverty to these shores that I 
might obtain an education, which there I could not 
have done save as a "Charity Scholar," I am inclined 
not to fan the fire of affection to anything of a white 
heat for her, and especially at this time, when her chief 
business is to wipe from the face of the earth a simple, 
honest Christian Republic in the wilds of South Africa, 
that she may, in the words of Cecil Rhodes, uphold 
the "greatest commercial asset in the world, — the flag 
of England!" The place which the flag of England 
holds in my heart, can best be expressed by quoting 
the following lines of Henry Labouchere which ap- 
peared in the columns of the London "Truth :" 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 147 

"And the winds of the world made answer, 

North, South, and East and West ; 
Wherever there's wealth to covet, 

Or land that can be possessed; 
Wherever are savage races 

To cozen, co-erce and scare, 
Ye shall find the vaunted ensign — 

For the English flag is there. 

Aye, it waves o'er the blazing hovels 

When African victims fly, 
To be shot by explosive bullets, 

Or to wretchedly starve and die! 
And where the beach-comber harries 

The isles of the Southern Sea, 
At the peak of his hellish vessel, 

'Tis the English flag flies free ! 

The Maori full oft hath cursed it 

With his bitterest dying breath ; 
And the Arab has hissed his hatred 

As he spits at its folds in death. 
The hapless fellah has feared it 

On Tel-el-Kebir's parched plain, 
And the Zulu's blood has stained it 

With a deep indelible stain. 

It has xxoated o'er scenes of pillage ; 

It has flaunted o'er deeds of shame; 
It has waved o'er the fell marauder 

As he ravished with sword and flame. 
It has looked upon ruthless slaughter, 

And massacres dire and grim; 
It has heard the shrieks of the victims 

Drown even the jingo hymn. 

Where is the flag of England? 

Seek the lands where the natives rot; 



I48 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM, 

Where decay and assured extinction 

Must soon be the people's lot. 
Go search for the once-glad islands, 

Where disease and death are rife, 
And the greed of a callous commerce 

Now battens on human life! 

Where is the flag of England? 

Go ! sail where rich galleons come, 
With shoddy and loaded cottons, 

And beer, and Bibles and rum ; 
Go, too, where brute force has triumphed, 

And hypocrisy makes its lair ; 
And your question will find its answer — 

For the flag of England's there!" 

May the God of nations preserve our loved banner 
of stars from such a mission, and such a curse as that ! 

Perhaps it would be nearest the truth to say that we 
of America neither hate nor love England. We try 
to remain impartial. When she does well, we applaud 
her; when she does ill, we condemn her. We are 
proud of her literature. We admire her great men, 
not because of their nationality, but because of their 
genius, and above all, because of their manhood. 
Because they were great men rather than great Eng- 
lishmen, we reverence and honor Shakespeare, and 
Hampden and Sidney and Dickens and Thackeray for 
their deeds and thoughts, and for their hatred of sham, 
and for every impulse they have given to honest en- 
deavor and human freedom. We do not admire the 
Arnolds and the Froudes who came to us with pessim- 
isms, and perverted history. We did not sing loud ho- 
sannas for Wilkie Collins, because he said nothings 
worthy a shout or a song. We of America try to judge 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 149 

men according to their value, because they are men, 
and not because they are English, or French, or Ger- 
man or of any other land or tongue. We once loved 
Charles Kingsley, because of his "Alton Locke," and 
"Westward Ho !" and for the sweet sermons delivered 
in "auld lang syne" to his little country congregations. 
In the old time, we believed him to be the exponent of 
the better humanity; we felt that his heart went out 
to the slave, and were proud of his championship of 
our Republic. In the terrible days of our civil war, 
when men sought to destroy this fair nation, and when 
our flag had been insulted and degraded, we expected 
sympathy and cheer from Charles Kingsley, but we 
were disappointed; he had gone out from his simple 
tender rectorship at Eversley, and had become a pro- 
fessor of history in an ancient university, and chaplain 
to the Queen; he became the toady and lick-spittle 
of aristocracy; he interpreted history wholly from the 
-standpoint of the Tory; he became the sycophant of 
"my lord and lady;" he became a renegade from the 
hiigh principles of his earlier manhood for the sake of 
petty distinction: 

"Just for a handful of silver he left us, 
Just for a ribbon to stick in his coat." 
We did not honor him therefore, because he had 
ceased to be a man ! The Lyceum Platform of Amer- 
ica is open to all who are men, no matter from what 
land they come. It gave a royal welcome to Stanley 
and Farrar and dear Ian Maclaren; it will always 
welcome honest, earnest, just and loving souls who 
come with messages of faith and fairness, love and 
liberty. 



150 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

Our own country is fertile in the production of just 
such men as the people love to hear. Whether Eng- 
lishmen come or go, we shall continue to honor and 
profit by our own DeMotte and Dinsmore, Copeland 
and McClary, Gordon of the South-land, who brings 
its warm kisses to the tremulous lips of the passing 
Northern soldier; Henson, the inimitable Baptist 
jester and moralist; Dolliver and Vincent; Fowler and 
Watterson, each man, though of once opposing sec- 
tions, speaking in eloquent and truthful terms of Abra- 
ham Lincoln, and twining for the pale brow of that 
friend of white and black alike, the forget-me-nots of 
love! The Lyceum Platform is still an evangel of 
good as of old. Its lectures are strong in character 
and are of the noblest order of knighthood, because 
they are men. 

How wide the influence, and how great the responsi- 
bility of the popular lecturer ! In a vague and general 
sense, all people concede the power of oratory. The 
close student of the sources of human influence fully 
recognizes that power, in all its good and evil possi- 
bilities, over the masses of the common people. 
Eloquently spoken words produce deeper and more 
immediate, if not permanent, results than eloquently 
written ones. There is perhaps in the person of T. 
DeWitt Talmage, an exception to this rule. He is 
the only living man who can make written words speak. 
His written sentences have voices. Printed rhetoric 
with him is alive with the semblance of utterance, of 
intonation. To me, this is inexplicable. In this 
peculiar power, save in the instance of the Christ, 
neither reading nor experience has revealed his dupli- 
cate. 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 151 

When Demosthenes delivered a patriotic oration, 
providing it was pregnant with truth, with honesty, 
the people who heard him said at once, "Let us go and 
fight Philip !" A little child, after listening to George 
Whitefield's beautiful and impassioned pictures of 
Heaven and the Deity, sobbed "Let me go to Mr. 
Whitefield's God!" Recently during the Methodist 
Conference at Kansas City, Dr. Leonard, a man of 
commanding presence and great dramatic intensity, 
declared that no nation of the world had done more 
to civilize and bless humanity than England. Scores 
of those who listened to him were in whole-hearted 
sympathy with the Africanders, now fighting for 
Republican freedom as against the dominion of 
Empire, and yet even these responded with an out- 
burst of applause. During the Presidential campaign 
of 1896, a little wiry, nervous man, a natural orator, 
daily addressed great crowds of people, many of whom 
were of the idle, discontented class, in the city of 
Cleveland. The utterances of the man were of an 
incendiary character ; he denounced the wealthy classes 
as thieves and brutal task-masters ; all workmen were 
siaves, and they were bound to such an extent with 
the manacles of the rich man's greed and selfishness, 
that the negroes of the southern rice-swamp were 
veritable freemen as compared with them. "It is 
your duty," he said, "to lift your hands against your 
employers! You should shoot! You should burn! 
You should give them the benefit of the workingman's 
best friend — dynamite!" This orator moved his 
hearers to a pitch of dangerous enthusiasm. They 
were filled with satanic fury. Acts of lawlessness 



152 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

were common as a result of those speeches. To this 
day, that anarchist orator is quoted at the assemblages 
of strikers, free thinkers and ultra-socialists. He made 
a permanent impression. 

It is not necessary to multiply instances to illustrate 
the power the orator possesses to move the common 
mind and heart, and to fix upon a high or low plane, 
the common conscience. Be he right or wrong, the 
public speaker, the lecturer, who is sincere in his con- 
victions and who possesses that quality, which for the 
want of a better name is called magnetism, who is 
dominated by the storm of the heart rather than the 
head, and who is at once pathetic, persuasive and 
commanding — in short an orator — will wield an influ- 
ence for good or ill, that is subtle and practically ir- 
resistible, and because of that fact, his responsibility 
is tremendous. 

I am frank to say that I have no respect for the 
lyceum lecturer, and especially if he be an orator, 
who does not regard the opportunities of the platform 
with reverence, and with a spirit and determination 
to not only entertain, but to wisely instruct, inspire 
and bless all who hear him. To this end, one needs 
much right preparation, and much prayerful self-ex- 
amination. To do good, and fear not, should be the 
paramount aim of every lecturer. This implies, and 
requires honesty with tact ; the "all things to all men" 
of Saint Paul. This requires too, right thinking, and 
above all right living, if the lecturer is to continue a 
permanent force. There must be a man behind the 
words spoken. It is not enough to be an editor, a 
writer, a lawyer, a discoverer — the speaker must be 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 153 

a MAN, while he is an orator. The common people 
will respect and keep in sweet remembrance the man, 
whatever else he may be. 

I am just sufficiently old-fashioned to insist, that 
after all, the true definition of that eloquence which 
dieth not, is character, and not reputation. 
The high and sublime purposes of men; the, 
good in them, the truth, the word which by its sweet 
and faithful utterance moves hearts, with heads, in 
ways of right, 'til right shall be adamant, are the es- 
sentials of character. Reputation is too often a fiction 
— a thing half rags and half rainbows. Character is 
a fact. It is one of the Eternal Verities. Lecturers 
thus equipped are evangels of beauty and of blessing. 

I doubt if the pages of biography can muster a bet- 
ter showing of manly men, men whose lives will bear 
the search-light of the sun, than the Lyceum Plat- 
form of to-day. Personally, I know of no name 
whose purpose or work is not high. Many known to 
me are men with a mission, and that mission is evi- 
dent, not only in words spoken, but in acts performed. 
Many indeed are lovable souls. George MacDonald 
once said, "If I can put the touch of the sunrise into 
any man or woman, I shall know that I have been 
working with God!" MacDonald must have had 
-some knowledge of Willitts, our "Apostle of Sun- 
shine," when he said that. A leading physician of 
Marshalltown, la., after hearing DeMotte's "Harp of 
the Senses/' the soul of which is that "thoughts are 
deeds and may become crimes," said, "I will buy fifty 
dollars' worth of tickets and give them to young men 
of my acquaintance, if that lecture can be repeated 



154 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

here." How the moral "back-bone" of a community 
stiffens with the steel of righteousness and courage, 
after Thomas Dixon has appeared in it! What a 
wonderful man he is! Whenever I see him, I think 
of the corn of Kansas, the tasseled tops of which are 
sixteen feet above the soil in which it grows. This 
man is fully six and one-half feet in height, straight 
as an Indian, thin as a lightning-rod, with hair of the 
hue of the raven, and eyes with the glint of midnight 
stars. He is a miracle of nervous energy. He is un- 
harnessed speed personified. When he speaks, you 
think of a limited train going a mile a minute, — only 
this human train is limited to two stops, — the start 
and the finish. One wonders if he breathes at all 
during the two hours of his effort, or if it is all done 
on the one long breath he drew before he began. His 
words fall like snow-flakes in a high wind. He 
sweeps on like the Bedouin lover on his "stallion shod 
with fire." He tells us about the iron-willed men of 
the world whose back-bones were of moral steel. He 
tells us that the thing needed to-day is courage of 
conviction and courage of action. He is on the hunt 
for strong men and he rides fast and far. To this 
man, sin is a mad dog loose in the streets, and he 
fears not to take him by the throat. 

I heard an infidel say after listening to Thomas 
Dinsmore's "Wonderful Structure," that splendid 
presentation of the mechanism and moral place of 
man in the universe: "I have found my lost faith 
again." I know a soldier of the Northern army, of 
the blue, who left a leg at Gettysburg, who said, "I 
thank God that I have lived to hear that loving peace- 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. I55 

maker from Georgia, John B. Gordon. We are 
brothers after all !" Would you know of what stuff 
martyrs are fashioned? You should hear William 
Crawford tell of Huss and Wycliff, or Gunsaullus of 
Savonarola. Would you set your heart in tune and 
time of melodies of human freedom, you should listen 
to Dolliver of Iowa, that eloquent man and genial 
spirit. 

There is a man of Philadelphia whose place and 
influence upon the platform are of uncommon strength. 
His figure, his words, his thought and delivery are 
incarnate with power. Physically, he is tall, spare, 
but compactly knit. His face is one of great earnest- 
ness, yet kindly withal. He speaks forcibly, yet at 
first with something of indifference. For ten or fif- 
teen minutes, the listener experiences a feeling of dis- 
appointment. He labors under the mistaken impres- 
sion that he is not going to hear much. He is sure 
the lecturer has been over-rated. Some years ago, I 
heard Matthew Simpson, perhaps the greatest Meth- 
odist orator since Whitefield. He began in a slovenly 
fashion. A man in front of me said to his neighbor : 
"He can't lecture; let's go." "Wait awhile," replied 
the other." In a half hour, the doubting Thomas was 
on his feet, and when Simpson concluded, the man al- 
most ran toward the platform, leaped upon it, seized 
the hand of the great speaker, and held it for some 
time, unable to say a word. There have been times 
when men have been moved like that by this man 
of Philadelphia. His lectures are replete with strong 
statements. The adamant of truth, however, lies un- 
der them. He bristles with facts. He compels his 



156 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

hearers to feel within themselves the masterfulness 
which he possesses. When he speaks, we know that 
life is pregnant with opportunities, that even the poor- 
est and humblest may be kings on the earth, if they 
will, and that the common folk of the world are often 
its grandest heroes. We ask about this man who 
has so moved and filled us with hope and courage, and 
we learn that he was born in an humble cottage ; that 
he has fought his way to the front of the armies or 
mankind with weapons in the main of his own forg- 
ing; when his country called to freedom's battle-field, 
he responded; when the news came that Spurgeon, 
the great Commoner of the Master, was dead, he 
wrote a life of him for the inspiration of the masses. 
Knowing the power of education to the poor, this 
man built a great college, and equipped it with mas- 
terly teachers and trainers, and for a beggar's pence 
of a price, has opened its doors to the humblest, if he 
be but pure and in earnest; he wished to draw the 
multitudes into the sweet and safe paths of righteous- 
ness, and he established a great church, where five 
thousand of the common people gather to listen and 
be made glad ; when one learns all this and more, the 
secret is out. We know that here is a man for his 
"work's sake." He is Russell H. Conwell. 

A personal contact with the lecturers of this time, 
be it but a passing touch by the way, often reveals 
much of kindliness, and of gentle grace and gener- 
osity. I was riding, a few years since, upon a train 
in Western Pennsylvania. At a station, a broadly- 
fashioned man, with a radiant face came into the car 
where I sat, looked me over, smiled, opened his satchel, 



THE LYCEUM PLATFORM. 157 

took out a book and wrote something on the fly-leaf 
with a pencil, and handed it to me saying, "You ought 
to have this book; they tell me everywhere of your 
tender stories of children ; you will like this book." It 
was called "The Knighting of the Twins." I read 
upon the fly-leaf these words, "To my friend Dr. Hed- 
ley, with the best wishes of DeWitt Miller." I had 
never seen him before. He is the omniscient one, this 
DeWitt Miller. 

The influence of such souls as these can but benefit 
and inspire, and that without limit. That men such 
as these have a deep and earnest sense of the grave 
responsibility which attaches to the life and work of 
the lecturer is unquestioned. Through storm and 
shine, at night and by day, by rail and river, these 
men with messages go forth, and with much of he- 
roic sacrifice, often speak words of comfort, of in- 
struction, of inspiration, and the millions of the com- 
mon people hear them gladly. They are men as well 
as lecturers. That I am one with them, and of them 
is the supreme joy of my life. The way has been long 
and hard, but I have found my "philosopher's stone." 
Relatives of my own blood and kinship have often 
discouraged me in years gone by, with words of doubt 
and carping criticism. The words of sacred writ are 
still true; "A prophet is not without honor, save in 
his own country, and in his own house." In 
the house of my present blest abode, every inmate 
believes in me and my work ; would that all men might 
have the service and the strength of such faith and 
such cheer. I have tried to answer the questions so 
often put to me, and with which I began this sketch: 



158 TWENTY YEARS ON THE LECTURE PLATFORM. 

"How did you get on the Lyceum Platform? What 
is the secret of your success? How can I get there, 
and how can I succeed?" I can best close with the fol- 
lowing lines from the pen of Samuel Kiser, the genial 
numorist of whom the world will hear much anon : 

"He struggled along for years, 

On a rough and a lonesome road— 

In days that were fair, 

And through mazes of care, 

He patiently carried his load. 

And oft, as he journeyed along, 

Dull aches crept into his heart, 
And he doubted and wondered if, after all, 

He had not mistaken his part. 

Would the dreams he had dreamed come true? 

Or must he sink down some day, 
Looking back on the past, 
And knowing at last, 

That he had mistaken his way? 

But he manfully struggled along 

In soul-chilling weather and fair; 

Till friends of his youth began seeking him out — 
And he knew he was getting there! 



Afton Place, Cleveland, O. 
June, 1 90 1. 



> 
u u 

u 

W O . 
IU ck 



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■I, 

II 

si 




You may not live in a palace, with polished 
floors, shining walls, and marble halls; better 
you do not, least these things, and not the hearts 
in it be your idols; it may be that the place of 
your abiding is simple and the splendor of its 
architecture only that which the deft fingers of 
Nature may fashion — columns of clematis in 
purple and white, and capitals of roses in 
scarlet and gold — but if love be in it, and faith, 
and truth; if husband be honored, wife cherished, 
and children led in ways of righteousness, you 
have a home indeed, u a mansion not made with 
hands ," and riches and honor and, happiness 
unspeakable are there. 



THE 

SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE 



PREFATORY NOTE. 



During the past twenty years, "The Sunny Side of 
Life" has been delivered in all parts of America from 
the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains, and has 
been listened to by more than a half million of people. 
Its reception everywhere has been most enthusiastic. 
It has cheered many sad hearts and strengthened many 
fainting souls. Its mission has been that of a messen- 
ger of hope, contentment, courage and joy to the com- 
mon people. In compliance with hundreds of requests 
spoken and written, it is now printed for the first time 
that it may be given an enduring place in the literature 
of our country when my presence shall be missed, and 
my voice shall be called to join the "choir invisible" in 

the land of fadeless sunshine. 

James Hedley. 



Cleveland, O., "Month of Roses," 1901. 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE. 



Happiness is purely and wholly a personal condition 
— a state of the mind, the heart and the conscience. 
It is not dependent upon surroundings ; no matter how 
the wand of prosperity's wizard may have touched them 
into comfort and beauty, or the pencil of nature may 
have sketched into the landscape and the sky their 
glory and light. Happiness is in nothing objective, but 
in everything subjective ; it is within us, not without us. 

While walking through a splendid avenue in a beau- 
tiful city, I once heard a silly, empty-faced chattering 
girl say to another, as they approached a magnificent 
house of granite, where dwelt a millionaire, "O ain't 
that just perfectly lovely! If I only had a rich hus- 
band, and lived in a house like that, you just bet I'd be 
liappy. O dear, O dear!" 

The girl was mistaken. The dissatisfied, complain- 
ing sigh at the end of her remark proved that she was 
wrong. Her empty, cheerless countenance indicated 
the possession of but little capacity for happiness under 
any circumstances, unless it might be a sort of animal 
content such as a kitten manifests, when in the quiet 
twilight of the evening it croons a droning vesper 
when curled up on a rug before the fire. 

I know the history of that granite house. Its lord 
and master, in the city, is the king of business. He 



164 THE) SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

holds in the hollow of his hand the financial standing 
and the welfare of a thousand souls. Should he turn 
his hand over, there would be dire dismay, ruin and 
death. He is a coarse, selfish, grasping, grinding 
"Scrooge" of a man — a deist, whose one god is money 
— a fellow with a faith — twenty per cent, and good se- 
curity. An observer of human nature, skilled in the 
reading of faces, may see in his eyes the reflected shin- 
ing of the tears of widows; may trace upon his thin 
hard lips the record of his oft-repeated "No!" when 
poverty hath cried, and unwise investment begged for 
just a little time. He loves nobody. He is in sym- 
pathy with nothing noble. With his wife, he has not 
spoken for years. His son, a vagabond, he long since 
kicked into the street. His daughter eloped with the 
proverbial coachman — she preferred Heaven with the 
coachman, to the other place with her father. He 
mutters "dollars and per cent." as he slouches along 
the streets. His hair is white. His step is slow. His 
days are in the shadow. His nights are filled with 
spectres. He is miserable. The wrinkled face of a 
certain old sexton puckers into a grin of glee when- 
ever be meets him, and he chuckles to himself, "Just 
a little longer, and I'll get you 1" 

The girl was mistaken. There is no happiness in 
that granite house. Ah ! but things might be different 
were she installed as its mistress. I doubt it. I find 
it to be a fixed law of character, that the covetous are 
always discontented. If today is not sufficient, tomor- 
row will not be. Complaining lips are the slaves of a 
complaining nature. The organization is bad, and 
unless by the exercise of the will the mind be developed 

£ 

4 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 165 

into fixed habits of patience and cheerfulness, a thou- 
sand palaces of granite cannot eliminate the soul's 
wretchedness and complaining. Covetousness is not 
content with any acquirement; it cannot be happy in 
any circumstance. 

Happiness is not in the world — it is in the heart — for 
the human heart, just like a garden, if it be properly 
cultured, will bring forth blossoms in abundance. Sow 
the seeds of cheerfulness and the flowers of joy will 
spring into life; neglect it, and the nettles of fretful- 
ness and the weeds of misery will be the harvest. That 
spirit which constantly wants something else, and con- 
tinually cries out against what it has, is like a bottom- 
less pit — it cannot be filled. Happiness would be far 
more common if men and women were only possessed 
of sufficient common sense to know when they are 
satisfied. 

An old-fashioned practical farmer put up a sign on 
his premises which read, "This farm of mine will be 
given to any man who can conscientiously say he is 
perfectly satisfied." 

One day a man called and claimed the farm. 

"You are perfectly satisfied?" inquired the farmer. 

"I am," replied the man. 

"Then what in the name of common sense do you 
want of my farm ?" 

Had he been given the farm he would have been no 
more satisfied than he was without it. 

Too many of us are apt to imagine that he is the 
happier man who is in possession of the things which 
we lack and desire. We leave out of our calculations 
all the drawbacks and the counterbalancings, and for- 



l66 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFK. 

get that he whom we envy may be lacking in much 
which we possess, or may have some ghastly skeleton 
in his closet, or ghostly phantom flitting about his fire- 
side. 

Little natures, selfish hearts, empty souls all wear 
the stamp of envy, while great natures, generous hearts, 
full souls, envy nothing. Envy is not far removed 
from malice, and malice is often the parent of murder.. 
It is related of an Arabian King that when his archi- 
tect had finished for him a structure of magnificence 
and beauty, he ordered him to be dashed to pieces from 
the top of its tallest tower, for fear he might build i« 
palace of superior splendor for some rival King ! 

Splendid architecture, great wealth, physical beauty, 
and all the pastimes and entertainments of the most 
expensive art can do nothing but create envy's craving 
and the bitterest dissatisfaction, unless the halls of the 
heart echo with contentment's minstrelsy, and the 
floors ring with the tuneful steps of the soul's glad 
dancers. 

There is a belief in the minds of many that possibly 
under some other sky, or in the midst of other scenes, 
or with some other people, happiness may be founa.. 
Like the old lady who sought her spectacles, while all 
the time they rested just above her brow, they go about 
seeking for that which is very near at hand. Far 
away, somewhere, beyond the shadowed hills of the 
life that now is, the gleam of the sunshine must be 
brighter ! Somewhere there is a Utopian land, a Brook 
Farm, on a new Atlantis where all things are carried 
out on some lofty perfect plan, — some high-plane 
transcendental system — where we poor mortals can eat 



THE SUNNY SIDE OE UFB. 167 

more, and sleep longer, and be dressed up all the time, 
and ride in golden chariots, and have less stingy hus- 
bands and more beautiful wives ; some wonderful land 
where babies never cry, where meals need no cooking, 
and where dishes wash themselves; some wonderful 
Land where people always tell the truth, where debts 
need no paying, and wnere the milkmen do not skim 
the milk on the top, and then turn it over and skim it 
on the bottom ! There must be some such wonderful 
Land where the weary soul can be satisfied and find 
rest ! 

Bless your good hearts, if the nature is such that 
present conditions and surroundings afford no glad- 
ness, happiness cannot be gathered from any circum- 
stance of time, place or condition. We should not for- 
get that the world is full of balancing and compensa- 
tions, and that all the joys of life at best are only rela- 
tive, comparative. 

Saadi, the tender Persian poet, whose words breathe 
a wisdom and a kindly comfort as sweet and almost as 
true as a bit of Divine inspiration itself, tells us that 
but once in his life did he complain of his condition — 
when his feet were naked, and he had not the money 
with which to buy shoes — but that meeting a man with- 
out feet, he was ashamed of his discontent and deter- 
mined never again to complain. 

Thousands every year rush across the sea to Europe. 
What for ? In search of happiness, they tell us, pleas- 
ure and the beautiful — heedless of the fact that if there 
be but joy within, then is there joy at home, and that 
in this marvellous America, the sky, painted by the 
brush of God, is just as blue ; the fields, daisy-starred, 



168 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UEE. 

are just as green, while the glad canticle sung by the 
choir of Niagara's voices, and the rhythmic tinkle of 
Minnehaha's laughter are nowhere equaled across the 
sea! 

The measure and limit of gladness is in one's own 
nature, and not in one's opportunities or means, but 
wholly and only in one's nature. A travelling Irish- 
man who had gone the whole round of the Continent 
was returning home satiated with having seen nothing, 
when in a field by the roadside he saw a fight. He 
promptly stopped his carriage, hastened at once to the 
scene of action, and without one question as to the 
cause at issue took sides, received his due amount of 
blood and bruises, and hobbled back to the carriage, 
exclaiming, "Be jabers, that's the first bit of rale down- 
right happiness I have had since I wint away from 
home I" Everything depends upon one's nature. 

The needed helps toward happiness are very few. 
The rich man possesses no great advantage over the 
poor man, for after all, wealth is not happiness. Kings 
live not so much in the sunshine as do the common 
people. History affords no instance of a crown or a 
scepter that were not golden fetters and glaring mis- 
eries. If the elements, the attributes, the principles of 
happiness be not within a man, earthly grandeur and 
royal station can no more let the sunshine into his soul 
than they can add one cubit to his stature. 

At the outset of life, we all may give this problem 
of joy a perfect solution by accepting and acting upon 
the words of the poet Young : 

"None are unhappy, all have cause to smile, 
But such as to themselves that cause deny/' 



THE SUNNY SIDE OE UEE. 169 

There is a silver lining to every cloud, but only for 
those who will look for it. The truest happiness is 
that of sweet Christian philosophy which wants but 
little and having little, can thank God for it, and get 
along with less. The power and majesty of human 
character consist not so much in the ability, for then 
we deserve no credit, but in the willingness to try and 
look on the sunny side of things. The great Dr. 
Johnson once said: "The habit of looking at the 
bright side of every event is better than a thousand 
pounds a year." Bishop Hall beautifully, truthfully 
and quaintly remarked, "For every bad there might be 
a worse; if a man breaks his leg he ought to thank 
God it was not his neck!" When Fenelon's library 
was on fire, he exclaimed, "I enjoy the splendor of the 
conflagration, and I thank the Good Father it is not 
the cottage of some poor man!" If there is shadow 
on the left hand, turn from it — on the right hand lies 
the sunshine. It was a German store-keeper who 
said: "The first night vot I open my shtore I count 
my money, and find him not right; the next night I 
count him again, and tere be tree tollars gone; vot 
you tink I do then, hey? You bet I fix him — I do 
not count him any more, and he vos just come out 
right ever since !" I like the spirit of that chap who, 
when hungry, sold his coat for a loaf of bread, and 
when a dog snatched the bread and ran away with it, 
exclaimed : "Thank Heaven, I still have my appetite 
left!" Misfortune is brimful of pleasure; it simply 
wants fishing out. One of the most delightful ex- 
amples of a man's determination to look on the bright 
side of an unfortunate affair was in the instance of a 



I70 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

German soldier, who laughed tremendously all the 
time he was being flogged, and when at the end of 
the flogging the officer inquired the cause ot his 
mirth, broke out into a fresh fit of laughter. "Ha! 
ha! ha! Goodness gracious! You've been lickin te 
wrong man!" 

How grandl) Beethoven, the world's master spirit 
of music, rose above the trials and afflictions of his 
life into the realms of joy and melody! When we 
think of the sad privations of Beethoven's physical 
and affectional nature, it becomes a matter for which, 
with him, we too should rejoice, while we marvel at 
the genius and the joy of his soul whose creations 
have lifted and still lift enraptured thousands to 
Heaven. The most beautiful, the most wonderful, the 
most original of his creations were produced when his 
physical ear had been almost wholly paralyzed; still, 
through the sounding aisles of his soul, swept in tune- 
ful grandeur the waves of melody's ocean! On the 
occasion of his last public appearance at a festival in 
his honor, during the performance of his more than 
matchless Ninth Symphony, he sat with his back to 
the great audience, unconscious of the applause that, 
like a tropic whirlwind, swept through the theater. As 
deaf and unmoved as a stone, he sat in the midst of 
shouts of thunder ! A friend, who loved him, touched 
him, and signalled that he should turn and witness the 
enthusiasm of the multitude his music had thrilled. 
He turned — his face, hitherto white and expressionless 
as a marble image in the blackness of night, lighted 
with a beauty that only joy can illuminate — the flood- 
gates of joy were opened wide, and the soul of the 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 171 

Master rose to the summit of ecstacy's Mount of 
Transfiguration ! 

See where he sits, the lordly man, 

The giant in his singing; 
Who sang of love, although for him, 

No lover's bells were ringing! 
The man who struck such golden chords, 

As made the world in wonder, 
Acknowledge him, though poor and dim, 

The mouth-piece of the thunder! 

He heard the music of the skies, 

What time his heart was breaking; 
He sang the songs of Paradise 

Where love has no forsaking — 
And though so deaf, he could not hear 

The tempest's thunder-token, 
He made the music of his soul 

The grandest ever spoken ! 

Duty demands that we direct our steps down 
the paths where the sunshine falls. The best good of 
society depends upon the individual's personal efforts 
toward righteous pleasure, for righteous pleasure is 
the only good. "Rejoice and be exceeding glad" is 
a Divine Command, and they who shun the sweet 
smiles of life, and turn a deaf ear to the music of hon- 
est laughter, are not only disobedient children of the 
Infinite One, but are guilty, sometimes, of the crimes 
of disturbing sanity's balance, and of spiritual and 
affectional suicide and murder. Laughter is often 
God's guarantee against insanity ; it is the balance- 
wheel in our metaphysical, our psychological struc- 
tures. Men who do not laugh are not only sad men, 



172 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

but often bad men, and they have been mad men. 
Long-continued mental depression must produce some- 
thing of brutality and crime. 

You remember doubtless that Frederick, the father 
of Frederick the Great of Prussia, was a willing slave 
to the most depressing fits of melancholy, insomuch so 
that his entire nature, once joyous, hopeful and kindly, 
became brutally morose and cruel. He treated his 
children with the grossest cruelty, compelled them to 
eat the most disgusting food and crowned this bru- 
tality by spitting into it. 

It matters not as to crowns and kingships and all 
the gems and baubles time may give, unless inside the 
halls of the heart there be the music of sweet con- 
tentment's song, and up and down the corridors of 
the conscience the joy-bells of honor, of righteousness 
and love ring out a glad jubilee, life can have no sunny 
side. 

Wealth, art, song, eloquence, music, beauty and 
even the brightest wit itself — none of these things can 
give to us aught of true gladness, unless the mind, the 
heart and the conscience be kindly and unselfish, pure 
and fair. 

Nowhere in literature may we find a more brilliant 
example of wit than Jonathan Swift, and yet what a 
wretched life was his ; how miserable his whole exist- 
ence. The nature of a wit is seldom happy. We are 
too apt to confound wit with humor. They are very 
different qualities. Wit comes out of the head ; humor 
is of the heart. Wit may be smooth and beautiful, but 
its beauty is like that of the lightning — its edge is 
like to that of a sword of Damascus. It cuts and 



the sunny side of ufe. 173 

maims, it bruises and severs. It leaves a wound behind' 
it. The wit never makes a friend. He makes sport 
at somebody's expense, and his mission seems to be 
to hurt somebody's feelings. 
• One, Mike, an Irishman, said to another: 

"Pat, how long can a gander stand on one leg?" 

"Oh ! git out wid ye — get up yersilf and find out !" 
replied Pat. 

That was a witty answer, but Mike did not like Pat 
quite so well after that. He had hurt his feelings and 
lost something of his friendship. 

A certain young lady who had enjoyed about forty 
magnificent summers and as many beautiful winters, 
was entertaining one night at her father's home a 
young man friend. Incidentally while chatting with 
the young man, she mentioned the fact of its being 
her birthday, and added : "I have here a beautiful book 
of poems which my papa gave me this morning as a 
birthday remembrance. I have such a dear good papa, 
he always gives me a book on my birthday." The 
young man replied: "What a splendid library you 
must have by this time !" That, too, was wit, but the 
young lady did not love the young man quite so much 
after that observation. 

If a young man would keep the heart of his best 
girl as his own heart, he must not be witty at his best 
girl's expense. Wit cannot keep love long. 

Humor is not like that. It is kindly and consider- 
ate. It never makes an enemy. The humorist would 
rather suffer himself than have any suffer because of 
him. 

Of the humorists of our time, there is in my heart 



174 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

a warm corner for that merry and sweetly tender soul, 
Robert J. Bmxhtte. Sides have ached with laughter 
with him, but never a heart at any word of his. Eyes 
brighten at his coming, and white cheeks blossom into 
roses of red when he smiles. 

Tom Hood, of England, was a humorist; you may 
read his every line, prose or poetic, and you shall not 
find a sting in one of them. The heart which could 
conceive his immortal "Song of the Shirt," the poem 
which opened wide the dismal windows of a hundred 
thousand garrets, that the eyes of truth, of pity and of 
love might look in, must have been one of unspeak- 
able tenderness. His was the heart of a humorist, 
because it was a heart of love. 

The humorist is never a pessimist, never a corn- 
plainer; he will suffer uncomplainingly, and smile 
in the face of death itself. 

It is related of the colonel of a certain New York 
regiment that while passing over the battlefield of 
Gettysburg, finding here and there some broken boy, 
now and then binding up a gaping, bleeding wound, 
he came upon a lad from his own command. He had 
been shot, and a great ragged hole was torn in the side 
of his face. Bending low above him, the colonel said : 
"My God, Jack, how you must suffer! I heard you 
was hurt, lad; I've been trying for an hour to find 
you, and have passed this way a dozen times. You 
must have seen me. Why didn't you call out to your 
old colonel, who loves you, Jack? I have a bandage 
and a canteen of water for you, my boy. Why didn't 
you speak to me, Jack?" Jack was the humorist of 
the regiment. He never hurt a heart by any word of 



THE SUNNY SIDE OE UFE. 175 

his however merry it may have been. Everybody 
loved him. Looking up into the eyes of his colonel, 
he said : "That's all right, old fellow. God bless you. 
I wanted the bandage and the water bad enough, but 
I couldn't ask you for them — why, you dear old fellow, 
I couldn't — look at me — I couldn't — I didn't have the 
cheek !" 

Even with the hand of death upon him, he would 
not hurt the heart of the old colonel who loved him, 
with one word of complaint. Jack was a humorist. 

Was Jonathan Swift, the prince of the wits of the 
world, like unto that in spirit? Someone said to him, 
"How shall we stop this terrible Irish famine ?" "Easy 
enough," he replied; "kill the babies of the poor, boil 
them, and when they are well done, feed them to the 
rich !" 

That was a witty answer, but a brutal answer, and 
no remedy for Ireland's hunger and heartache and 
tears. 

I like to lay down just here a little maxim after 
my simple fashion : "We may not be happy within from 
without, unless we are first happy without from with- 
in." It is all a within condition, and only from pure 
contented and loving within conditions of mind and 
heart and conscience may happiness come, or laughter 
to your lips or mine — laughter that shall be worth any- 
thing — helpful, honest, uplifting laughter. Such is 
the only laughter to encourage, to permit. Did you 
ever stop to think that very much of your character is 
revealed in your laughter? At what sort of things do 
you laugh with pleasure? Are you willing to tell all 
your stories of mirth at night at your mother's knee? 



176 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

Are you willing that your chaste wife or your sweet- 
heart should join with you while you tell or listen to 
stories told — told for the sake of laughter ! "Out of 
the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." Out 
of the measure of the heart the lips and tongue ripple 
forth a tribute to that which is healthful and clean and 
holy, or that which shall disease and smirch and 
profane. 

Forget not that the ear of God is listening to your 
laughter and mine, and that only the laughter which 
bubbles from a clean heart's fountain is fit for the 
hearing of Him who is all purity. I believe in clean 
and honest laughter. Let it sound. Let it ring till 
the hills of Heaven sing back an answering echo. 

Mothers, in your homes, stay not the children's 
laughter. When the soft shadows of evening fall like 
curtains about the house, and blue-eyed Bessie with 
eyes like Southern violets and hair in which the sun- 
light smiles, sits on this side the firelight, and black- 
eyed Tom, the wee Gypsey rascal, sits on that side, 
while they build the fairy castles of the fabric of their 
fancies and shout with laughter till the little room 
rings with music sweeter than the airs of Bellini, do 
you love them — let it sound ! Stay not that music. 
In after years, when the battle of life has grown fast 
and furious, and Tom and Bessie, man and woman 
grown, pause on the hill-tops weary and almost hope- 
less, the memory of that evening time, of that laughter 
and your smiles will give them hope and courage to 
cheerily and bravely fight again and again the conflict 
of living till the coming of that Morning whose vic- 
tory is all glory and whose dawning is peace. 



THE SUNNY SIDE OE WEE. 177 

I am not in sympathy with the doleful side of things. 
I cannot learn to love the croaker — the man who hates 
beauty, sneers at cheerfulness, mocks at bright colors, 
glad surroundings and handsome garments, and gives 
this dear old world to understand that he is not of it ; 
and so in word and look and dress is a veritable epitome 
of melancholy, who sits apart like some Sir John Dis- 
mal, Knight of the Rueful Countenance. In all the 
realms of healthful,- beautiful nature, you may not 
find one example upon which to base joyless asceticism 
The square-cut coat, straight vest and coal-scuttle bon- 
net of the sneerer at the beautiful were never made 
from any pattern in sweet Nature's book of fashion- 
plates. To my mind Nature is the true founder and 
model of fashion — the fashion of loveliness — and the 
mightiest and tiniest of her creations bear the stamp 
of her beautiful fashion. We may curl and crimp for- 
ever, and why should we not? I would not give a 
cent for my wife's hair if she did not crimp it — it is 
crimpable hair — and yet the dainty crimping on the 
edges of a fern-leaf done in Nature's fashion defies 
all our imitation. We wear pretty stars in our hair, 
and why should we not? Yet each day in the sum- 
mer we may trample down a million stars infinitely 
prettier when we tread on the daisies of yonder field. 
We coil beautiful tendrils with consummate skill about 
our bonnets, and there is no wise reason why we should 
not; but look you, down the face of yonder granite 
rock trails a floss-like mess with fairy leaves of pur- 
ple and green and gold, whose exquisite grace and 
dainty loveliness put all our imitative arts to shame. 
I like fashion. I believe in the mission of the beau- 



178 the sunny side of ufe. 

tiful. It breeds excellent conduct and compels good 
behavior. As a rule better manners walk beneath a 
decent hat, however modest the material, than under 
a dirty, greasy old "slouch" with a hole in it. 

When we go out to spend a pleasant well-conducted 
evening, we dress fittingly for the occasion, and we be- 
have with accompanying consistent decorum, because 
we have done so. There is a close connection between 
clothes and conduct, between dress and deportment. 
There is in my neighborhood a woman who, when she 
has on her slatternly garments is a gossipy, slanderous, 
scandalous, mischief-brewing creature, but when she 
puts on her fair and well-to-look-on clothing, behaves 
herself with admirable care and grace — she does not 
want to disgrace her clothes. Cleanliness, not only of 
the skin, but of the garments, is next to godliness as 
a rule. It is hard for a man to be godly while he is 
dirty. No man can be a decent or desirable church- 
member who wears a dirty shirt four consecutive Sun- 
days. The best work done by the Young Men's 
Christian Association is done in the bath-tub. Without 
frequent washing there will be no abiding worship. 
Christianity in a large measure depends for its con- 
tinuance upon water and soap. Helps toward right- 
eousness are to be had in the drug stores — perfumed 
helps — in the form of scented soaps at five cents a bar. 
May I commend the mission of the beautiful, the gos- 
pel of the cleanly, and the inspiration toward seemly 
behavior to be found in right fashion? Happiness is 
the frequent outcome of these things. My dear girl 
friend, if you look well with a rose in your hair, wear 
it. If you like the flashing of a gem upon your finger, 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF IJtfE. 179 

and you can afford it, put it on. If you believe you 
would be happy in a red dress, trimmed with yellow 
and blue and green, get into it. You have a right to 
these things, providing the mind be not neglected and 
the morals soiled to get them. Let the natural connec- 
tion between the outward garniture and the inward 
grace be maintained. The being within should hold 
hard the hand of the seeming without, so shall the 
two walk in the way of the Ever-Beautiful, where the 
.sweep of the soul's sunlight falls. It should not be 
forgotten that the "red fisherman" still angles for the 
daughters of Eve, and many a soul does he catch with 
his bait of finery. If ever there cometh an hour when 
a trinket, or a dress may be obtained at the cost of 
■character, and you wish to keep as your portion the 
sunny side of life, let the dress and the trinket go — 
keep your character. Holiness is better than a hat. 
The fashion of the beautiful is a good thing, but we 
may make it a vile thing — we may make anything a 
vile thing. Men have served the devil before now, 
and have justified the service with a Bible text. Women 
have gone the way of the wayward, with the pew of a 
church as the starting point. The influence of Christ's 
presence on earth was good, but it did nothing for 
Judas. The trouble was not with Christ, however, 
but with Judas. 

Be not tempted — tempt not your friend. Be your 
brother's guide, your sister's keeper. 

A certain young woman said, "I found my laces 
and jewels were dragging me down to hell, so I gave 
them all to my sister !" She had forgotten something. 
She had lost sight of the fact that they are the hap- 



l8o THE SUNNY SIDE OE LIFE. 

piest souls who, while determined to walk in the ways 
of righteousness, are willing to lead others with them. 
Let us be fair and gracious one toward another. Let 
us help one another. There is not a man in all the 
world, however humble and lowly he may be, but may 
do some good, if he is only willing to try. He may 
make some pathway smoother, some sky brighter ; he 
may bring the roses back to white cheeks again, and 
attune the broken voices of the sorrowing to laughter's 
key — he may do this if he is willing to try. It is again 
a within condition. He may fail in the trying, he may 
blunder; it matters not — the one thing needed is the 
right spirit, the willingness from within to try. He 
may blunder a thousand times, and we shall laugh 
not at him, but with him, and happiness shall come be- 
cause of the blunder and the laughter. 

A good-hearted, red-headed, rosy-cheeked, bay-win- 
dowed Irishman, innocent of the world, its fashions 
and its fads, was walking upon one occasion down 
Holborn street, London. Just in front of him marched 
with stately grace an elegantly attired lady. She 
had on a gorgeous cloak. Hanging below her cloak, 
he noticed two broad bands of ribbon. He did not 
know what they were for. He had never perused the 
"Delineator," or the "Mode" and therein ascertained 
that such "contraptions" were called "sashes" and 
were for ornament and not for use. To him, they were 
unattached straps, out of place and service and threat- 
ening imminent disorder and disaster. Stepping up to 
the lady, he lifted his ragged cap with the grace of a 
true gentleman, and said : "I beg your pardon, ma'am, 
but your galluses is untied !" He thought he saw dan- 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE. l8l 

ger, and it must not come if he could help it. He had 
"blundered, but his heart was in the right place. 

There is not a woman in all the world, however 
humble and lowly she may be, but may do some good, 
be it no more than to hush to sleep some tired mother's 
crying baby. Some years since, while on my way to 
a Florida Chautauqua, there chanced to be in the car 
with me a tired, sad-looking woman. She had a babe 
in her lap, a fragile blossom of a thing. She was go- 
ing to the sunny Southern country, hoping that the 
balmy breath of that sweet Southland might bring back 
the suffering little one's health and strength again. In 
pain, the baby moaned and fretted well nigh the whole 
journey through. It's cries annoyed a certain mas- 
culine passenger at one end of the car. He was a 
thick-necked, big- jawed, slouchy-lipped, pug-nosed, 
little-eyed, low-browed, flat-top-headed man. Such 
men seldom love babies. They love bull dogs better, 
and generally own two or three. Several times this 
man blurted out what you might have expected of him : 
"Why don't somebody shut up that infernal young 
one ?" 

There was another woman in the car — another tired, 
troubled woman. She was in mourning. Lines of 
care were on her brow. You would have known 
whether you read hearts in faces or not, that many a 
time and oft she had drunk salt tears from the rusted 
rim of the chalice of sorrow. These are the women 
who can appreciate and understand "heartbreak and 
crying" everywhere. This woman went to the first 
woman, and said, "I beg your pardon ; I do not know 
you — that is, I am a stranger to you, but you look so 



l82 THK SUNNY SIDE OF I,IFE. 

tired. Will you let me take your baby?" She tenderly 
took the tiny sufferer. She walked the car with it. 
She crooned lullaby songs to it — songs she had heard 
in her childhood, at the twilight hour. The baby began 
to look at her. Soon it smiled. Now it cooed soft 
murmurings sweeter than the music in the heart of 
a seashell. At last it slept, and by its smiling, we 
knew it dreamed beautiful dreams. The car was filled 
with sunshine. 

This is the secret of happiness. It is the last "good- 
night" of the Master to men put into action, into ser- 
vice. "A new commandment I give unto you that ye 
love one another !" 

Happiness never comes to the man who liveth to- 
himself alone. Montaigne, the cynic, revealed his ig- 
norance of the best of human kind when he said: 
"Man is like an ass going to market after a bundle of 
hay ; all the ass sees is the hay." And again that "The 
best of life comes only to those who live to themselves 
alone." All of the best and brightest of nature and 
of life is an undying refutation of such cynicism. 
Every summer night-wind that with the gentlest touch 
rocks the nodding flowers to sleep; every dewdrop 
kissing back to conscious life the panting mosses faint- 
ing in the roadside dust; every rain-drop that falls to 
swell the river's triumphant march to the sea; every 
sunbeam that tints the earth and sky with green and 
crimson and gold, and every carrier of a cross, whether 
in the trenches of toil, or upon Calvary, speak the uni- 
versal, eternal words "No man liveth to himself alone !" 

Sometimes Sir John Dismal goes to church. He 
ought to go. He ought to go anywhere if there be a 



i 



THE SUNXY SIDE OF I,IEE. 183 

chance to find a little honest gladness. He goes to 
church on God's glad day, groaning to worship (?) 
a cheerful Creator, a Creator who smiled when the 
work of making the world was done, who smiled and 
called it good. He sneaks down the aisle and slinks 
into his pew as if ashamed to be seen at the transac- 
tion. His face is so long you might wind it round a 
barrel and have an end left long enough with which 
to go a fishing in the Slough of Despond. 

If he be a member of the church, he is a half-cent, 
skin-flint member. He believes in that gospel which 
the poor have preached to them, because it costs noth- 
ing. He is the fellow who gets up at the close of a 
revival and shouts, "Thank God, I've been a member 
of this dear old church forty years, and it never cost 
me a cent!" How the minister must feel — the tired, 
unappreciated, badly-paid minister. How much the 
average little minister has to bear ! 

It makes me happy to champion the little minister. 
I have no axe to grind, because I have no congrega- 
tion to find fault with my words, and no board of trus- 
tees to call a meeting next Thursday night to consider 
my dismissal because something I said about temper- 
ance last Sunday morning did not suit one of them, 
who happens to be the man who pays the biggest pew 
rent and whose money came out of a "rum-shop" under 
the hill. Xo class of professional men do as mucK 
hard and commendable work as the little minister. 
He must prepare and deliver acceptably two original 
addresses each week. How many of us can do that? 
I cannot do it. I like a month to get ready. Give 
me a vear and vou shall have bettei service. Some 



I84 THE SUNNY SIDE OF I,IFE. 

people have strange notions about the amount of time 
required to get ready for a creditable address. It 
was my pleasure years ago to travel forty miles to 
hear Wendell Phillips deliver his lecture, entitled, 
"The Lost Arts," that dose of medicine for our com- 
mon American disease, egotism, egotism with bragga- 
docia complications. At the close of that wonderful 
effort in which he moved the people as the wind of 
Kansas sweeps the grass, it was my fortune to be pre- 
sented to him. Speaking for a company of young men 
with more or less ambition in the oratorical line, I 
said: "Pardon me, sir, but how long did it take you 
to prepare the lecture to which we have listened to- 
night?" "Up to tonight, young gentlemen," he re- 
plied, "it has taken me twenty-six years!" 

After hearing George Whitefield preach the same 
sermon for the fortieth time, Benjamin Franklin said : 
"I never heard that sermon before, for he delivered 
it as might an inspired Arch-angel !" The little min- 
ister does well twice a week. He must be in very close 
sympathy with the Divine teacher to do that. He must 
be a harp, the strings of which are touched by angel 
hands. The dear little minister. And yet he is human. 
He has a back to cover, a stomach to fill, a mind to 
feed, a wife and children to care for, and a hundred 
things to do which cost money, and in return for his 
work, his wonderful work, what of financial compen- 
sation gets he? A thousand dollars a year and a do- 
nation. You know what a donation is, because you 
have attended them. A donation is an occasion upon 
which the numerous members and friends of the 
church gather at the parsonage with gifts of slippers 



THK SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 185 

and doilies and remain long enough to eat up all the 
little minister has in the house. 

I remember a certain Presbyterian brother, and he 
might have been Methodist — there are some awfully 
mean men in the Methodist church — I know, because 
for the most part of my life I have been a Methodist 
— but he happened to be a Presbyterian. I have no 
desire to discriminate in the matter of creeds. One 
creed to me is as good as another, if Christ be in the 
heart of it. There are a great many different Chris- 
tian railroads, and they all run to the same Celestial 
Union Depot. We cannot all have the same creed, any 
more than we can all love and marry the same sweet- 
heart. Our tastes and needs and views differ. Some 
of us in our religious choosing are what we are because 
of temperament ; some because of education or example 
or precedent; some would not if they could, depart 
from the faith of childhood, when at mother's knee 
infant lips learned to lisp "Our Father." Today, be- 
cause of my love of and desire to please a good woman 
I am riding on the Congregational railroad train, and 
yet because of my childhood and my mother's knee, 
I love best the MethodLt route to God's Union Depot. 
The Methodist train is an accommodation train. It 
is the only train I know of that will back up and let 
a man get on again when he falls off. That is why I 
like it. But I started out with the story of a Presby- 
terian little minister. He labored faithfully for a cer- 
tain congregation for seven years for a beggarly finan- 
cial compensation. At the end of the seven years the 
trustees called on him and told him they decided to 
give him fifty dollars more each year. They were 



186 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

astonished when the good brother declined to accept it. 

"You don't mean to say you won't accept another 
fifty dollars." "Brethren," replied the little minister, 
"on conscientious grounds I must decline it; it takes 
all the time I can spare to go round and collect the 
money you say you pay me now, and if I have got to 
go about hunting an additional fifty dollars, I shall 
not have time to prepare for preaching, or anything 
else!" 

The Sir John Dismals of the church forget the prom- 
ise, "The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that 
watereth shall himself be watered," and that too with 
divine dews from the sky of Paradise. 

May we all not do something more toward leading 
the little ministers in the ways of the sunny side of life. 

The Sir John Dismals of the world as a rule are un- 
loving and loveless. John Dismal seldom or ever falls 
in love. He never falls in any way. He would not 
be so undignified and ungraceful, so precipitous, so ex- 
uberant and spontaneous as to fall in. That may do 
for youth, but he knows nothing of youth, however 
few his years may be. If by any chance of fate there 
comes to him an opportunity for love, he does not fall 
in, he deliberately and gravely walks in. With him, it 
is a matter of cautious conservatism and calculation. 
He surveys and sums up the points of his prospective 
bride as a jockey sums up the points of a colt he is 
about to purchase : "Good points, first-rate points, great 
width of shoulders and depth of chest — nothing evi- 
dently in the way of a consumptive tendency; head 
well-poised — seems to possess considerable dignity; 
face fairly intelligent — not much danger of my being 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE. 1 87 

made ashamed because of her ignorance; arms round 
and muscular — she can easily do a three weeks' wash- 
ing ; on the whole, quite a worthy creature — I will pro- 
pose to her." He does. 

"My dear young woman, I have very carefully and 
thoroughly taken into consideration all your several 
graces and advantages, and I find that I may safely 
say to you, will you unite your destiny with mine?" 
What a magnificent way to "pop!" Does love do 
things in that fashion? Love surely has something 
of warmth about it somewhere. How its eyes light I 
How its pulses thrill! How its words ring with elo- 
quent fervor ! Monarch, my own, my king, how noble ! 
Is there a sunny-eyed, glad-hearted girl in all the 
world who could render a tribute like that to a calcu- 
lating, frozen John Dismal who goes a-wooing after 
such a fashion ? What sort of a woman could live her 
life out with that kind of a man? None, unless she 
be like him — hard, cold, wooden and frozen, with no 
colors in the rainbow of her hope to fade out to the 
blackness of the darkness of despair, and no roses in 
the garden of her heart to wither away to dust and 
ashes. If she be like him she may go on — she may en- 
dure — until some day the thread of her life snaps, and 
like a puppet in a pantomime, or a marionette in a 
mum-show, she stops. 

The brightest, gladdest home experiences, the most 
delightfully beautiful fireside hours the heart can 
know, logically and naturally are the outcome, the se- 
quence of sunny courtships, winsome smiles, tender 
words, unselfish offerings — of hands that give and take 
not. There are silences, sweet silences that speak vol- 



l88 THF, SUNNY SIDE OF UFF,. 

umes of the language of the heart, and are as the sing- 
ing of the choristers of Heaven, compared with which 
John Dismal's stilted, metallic words are all a discord 
and a jangle. Words are not always essential to the 
bliss of the happiest wooing. 

Across the sea, in the land of the Shamrock and 
the four-leaved clover, a lover had passed some happy, 
swiftly-flying hours with his colleen. It had been a 
night of rapture. As he walked home to the little 
cot of his mother at the edge of the bog, the measure 
of his happiness was as the measure of the ocean. In 
the stars, he saw his colleen's eyes; in the moonlight, 
her smile, and in the red anemone of the fields, the 
ruby of her lips. In his hard bed of straw he dreamed 
of her, and his couch was soft, and his slumber sweet. 
In the morning, his face was radiant as he sat at his 
porridge and milk with his mother. Observing his 
smile, his mother said: "Ye must have seen Norah 
last night. What did she say to ye?" 

"Nothing." 

"Nothing, acushla! Did she have no words for ye 
— no welcome?" 

"Words is it?" Niver a word — but welcome — in- 
dade an' she had that mother. She looked into me 
eyes ; she held me by the hand ; she laid her head upon 
me heart, and she kissed me and kissed me and kissed 
me. For four hours I was in Heaven — words would 
have spoiled it !" 

In matters of the heart, honesty and frankness are 
essential to happiness. Honesty is the open door to 
the sunny experiences of life, especially along the mat- 
rimonial pathway. 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF I<IFE. 189 

Young man, be honest with your sweetheart; be 
frank and open, transparent as the day. Let her know 
just what you are. If there are mean things about 
you, tell her so. Let her know your faults. Do not 
pretend to what you have not. Do not deceive her. Do 
not lie to her. Do not let her wait till by sad experi- 
ence she discovers how contemptibly little you are, 
and break her heart in the discovery. Be honest at 
the outset. It will be better so. When the great Dr. 
Johnson courted Mrs. Porter, then a beautiful widow 
of England, he was honest with her. 

"Madam," he said, "I am nobody much. I have a 
little literary smattering, but really I am not much of 
a man. I have a villainous temper to begin with. I 
mean to try with your love and help to control it. I 
have no money ; the Duke, I understand, told you that 
I was rich — he is mistaken; I am poor. My dear 
madam, I suppose you want to marry into a good 
family — I have some good relatives, but all are not 
good, and have not been good by a long shot — I re- 
member one scalawag who was hanged !" 

The good widow responded : "Like yourself, Doc- 
tor, I have but little or no money, and while I have 
had no relations hanged, I have fifty who deserve 
hanging !" 

If in the time of courtship all were as honest as that, 
after experiences would show less of disappointment 
and sorrow. 

In our liking and our loving, our friendships and 
courtships let us be earnest and honest, unselfish and 
simple and natural. 

The love of the heart should be as the love of flow- 



190 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UEE. 

ers for the light — as the love of the morning-glory for 
the sunshine of the dawn. The simple, old-fashioned 
morning-glory! Cornet of the morning, trumpet of 
the dawn! Hark to the tiny notes that welcome the 
glad burst of the sunlight ! Watch it playing peek-a- 
boo up yonder through the lattice, one moment as bold 
as the morning, the next as bashful as the twilight, 
but always yearning to nestle in the heart of the sun- 
shine that twineth round its tendrils of green like 
gleaming skeins of the gold of a maiden's hair ! What 
an honest, earnest blossom! Who does not love the 
simple, unassuming, back-yard flower of the kitchen 
porch, the sweet, old-fashioned morning-glory! 

Let hearts be like that blossom — anywhere, every- 
where, in high or low estate, in castle or cot, simple 
and honest and earnest — sometimes rude and crude, 
but genuine and natural, and worth more as an ex- 
ample to you and me than any of the fashionable, in- 
cincere courtships beneath the blaze of chandeliers in 
the drawing-rooms of so-called society. 

Away down in Texas, a big-shouldered, double- 
fisted, red-headed lump of a fellow sat courting a blue- 
eyed, yellow-haired lass. He sat on one side of the 
room in a big oak rocking-chair, playing with a deer- 
hound that lay on the floor beside him. She sat on the 
other side of the room in a little oak rocking chair, 
stitching on a quilt — quite a gorgeous affair, which, 
because of the splendor of its pattern, she called the 
"Rose of Sharon." He tried to catch a fly that would 
light on the tip of "Cooney's" nose, but he said noth- 
ing. She stitched away on the stem of a "Rose of 
Sharon" and said nothing. Finally, she hitched her 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF UBB. 191 

chair over two or three feet and said: "What's your 
dog's name?" "Cooney." "What's he good for?" 
"Ketchin' possums." Then she stitched and stitched 
and stitched, and still the "Rose of Sharon" grew, but 
she said nothing. 

Presently he hitched his chair over two or three feet 
and said : "I think I'd like to — to — is your ma raisin' 
many chickens?" "About forty." 

Then she stitched and stitched, and still the "Rose 
of Sharon" grew, but she said nothing. At last he 
hitched his chair over two or three feet more, and she 
hitched hers again until the rockers got so mixed up 
that rocking became impossible. 

After a long pause, during which he tried again 
and again to rid Cooney's nose of the fly, he said: 
"Do you love, do you love — love cabbage?" 

"I'm awfully fond of cabbage." 

Again she stitched and stitched, and still the "Rose 
of Sharon" grew, but she said nothing. He still strug- 
gled with the fly. Finally, he almost shouted, "I've 
a good notion to pinch you!" 

"What you a good notion to pinch me for?" 

" 'Cause you won't have me, that's why." 

" 'Cause you ain't axed me, that's why." 

"Then I axes you." 

"Then you has me !" 

Cooney, the dog, stirred in his sleep, dreaming some 
one had whistled for him, but he was mistaken, the 
sound he heard was something else. 

Seriously, life without honest, earnest, simple 
natural loving has no sunny side. It may hang like 
a solitary leaf upon poverty's tree, but neither time 



I92 THE, SUNNY SIDE OF EIEE). 

nor storm shall fade it. Friends may vanish liice snow- 
flakes on the bosom of a river, still love shall remain 
sweet to the last. 

The roses may fade from your bonny old sweet- 
heart's cheeks, still to love's eye her wrinkled brow 
and whitened hair are always beautiful. 

His hair is white with frosts of years, 

Her feeble steps are slow, 
His eyes no longer brightly shine, 

Her cheeks no longer glow; 
Her hair has lost its sheen of gold, 

His voice its joyous thrill, 
And yet though faded, gray and old 

They're loving sweethearts still. 

Can you find aught of the sunny side of life among 
the affectations, dissipations and shams of fashionable 
society? There are so many thorns mixed with its 
roses that but few can hope to escape the lacerations 
of its sorrow and pain. Under the flare of gilded chan' 
deliers in many a parlor, if you do but listen close, 
you may hear the snapping of heart-strings mingling 
with the light step of the dancer's feet and the volup- 
tuous swell of the music. Affectation, dissipation and 
sham can provide nothing of the sunny side of life 
I recall quite a fashionable gathering. The elite were 
out in full force. The scene was one of fascinating 
splendor. A hundred lights blazed with the sheen of 
the sun. A hundred beautiful women — beautiful as 
the world of fashion goes — moved here and there with 
exquisite grace. Eyes flashed brilliant lights, out-vie- 
ing with their splendid brightness the scintillant dia- 
monds gleaming upon snowy arms. Beautiful hair t 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF LIFE. 193 

brown and black and golden; soft white hands; sen- 
suous music; flowers of rarest loveliness; it was a 
carnival night and the goddess of pleasure was queen. 
In a corner sat a plain pale-faced woman clad in some 
sort of simple brown material; about her neck, a bit 
of lace ; in her hair a real rose from a garden ; beyond 
these nothing of ornamentation about her, but her face 
was noble in its thoughtful power. Her broad fore- 
head betokened a mind of strength. In her great, full 
black eyes shone the fire of passionate ambition. Her 
Reman nose told of the determination of a conqueror. 
Her warm, red lips spoke of the tenderness of her 
heart. Her square, massive chin was a revelation of 
a will invincible. She had climbed the heights of life 
oft with torn hands and bleeding feet, and had reached 
the sun-kissed summit, and was one of the first in- 
structors in the schools of the nation. Her name was 
known to all that tinseled throng, had it been spoken i 
her face to but few — she did not train in that set. She 
had asked of the hostess of the gathering the privi- 
lege of an entrance with the reason reserved. She 
wished to gather knowledge of fashion's men and 
women in an hour of sham. The time was favorable. 
The gilded butterflies and tinseled drones began to fly 
and buzz about her. Miss Lillian Chatlove Tattlewit. 
whose gown was a symphony in green, the skirt £ 
dream or a nightmare, and the waist a poem, an un- 
finished poem (but an emerald necklace filled up the 
break in the measure), said to Charles Addlepate Lit- 
tlekin : "Charlie, do look there ! Did you ever see 
such an old frump in your life? I wonder who her 
dressmaker is ! I wonder where Mrs. Blowser ever 



194 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

picked up such an ancient fossil as that! Take me 
away, or I shall faint.'' 

During the course of the evening Miss Chatlove Tat- 
tlewit condescended to entertain the company with one 
of her finest vocal selections. For more than three 
years she had been a pupil of the great Madame Peepy- 
squeak and was altogether the too utterly splendid 
soprano star of the season. Of course she did not sing 
without very much importuning. "Lillian, dear, will 
you not be kind enough to sing something?" "No, 
certainly not. I am out of practice. My notes are 
not here. And you know, Charlie, these people have 
no appreciation. I could never get into sympathy 
with this listless and vulgar crowd." "Do sing some- 
thing for my sake," murmured Charlie, "just for me 
alone darling." "For your sake, Charlie? Could I 
refuse anything for your sake, Charlie?" 

Miss Lillian Chatlove Tattlewit gracefully gathered 
her skirts, and coquettishly wiggle-waggled toward the 
Steinway-Grand ; bestowed her drapery in classic folds 
about the stool ; gazed into Charlie's eyes, who fondly 
bent above her, with an expression like to that of a 
dying duck in a thunderstorm; plunged into the keys 
until they had an epileptic fit ; then she sang : 

"Darling, kiss my eyelids down, 

Underneath the limpid moon; 
With thy lips so soft and warm, 

In this dreamy, holy calm; 
Come, my love, ere night has flown, 

Darling kiss my eyelids down !" 

I should think Mozart would turn over in his grave 
and groan. 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 195 

You shall find more honest happiness in many a cot, 
writ in the "simple annals" of the toiling poor than in 
such a palace of sham. 

Old Sir John Sinclair, of England, once alighted 
from his coach at the door of a thatched cottage, and 
remained an hour talking with a lame, half-blind la- 
borer who lived there alone. "Well, old man," said 
Sir John at parting, "is there anything I can do for 
you ?" 

"Nay, Sir John, nought can ye do for me. There 
is not a thing in all the langth and bradth o' the 
world that I want." 

"Kate," called Sir John to his daughter, who was 
sketching a clump of buttercups near by. "Come here 
with your brushes and your canvas; it cost me much 
to make you an artist at London, and I have never 
asked you for a picture; sit down here and paint for 
me this old man and his cottage of thatch — it is the 
happiest spot in England!" 

And why? Because a toiling old man had carried 
in and kept with him that pearl of great price, the 
jewel of contentment. The secret of the sunny side 
of life was long since given to men by Paul, the half- 
sick, half-deformed apostle when he said: "I have 
learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be con- 
tent." 

No matter how these thoughts turn and turn, they 
cannot escape the first proposition of this theme. Hap- 
piness is within us, not without us. It is a condition of 
the mind, the heart and the conscience. Contentment 
and love and honesty are its fairies of good and of 
gladness. Happiness, too, depends upon trust, upon 



I96 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UFE. 

faith — faith in each other, faith in tomorrow, faith in 
God. We need the faith of the old black mammy of 
Georgia, who said: "Lawd bless yer honey, my sufF- 
rins ain't nuffin'! Sometimes de Lawd whips us and 
sometimes he leaves us, jess ter see ef we won't work 
and try again — but Lawd bress yer, honey, when we 
gits tired all out an' cries like a little baby, He takes 
us up in His arms an' comforts us." 

We need that attitude of the soul called faith. It 
is not possible to have happiness without faith. The 
man who doubts, distrusts, suspects, disbelieves, is 
never a happy man. The cynic, the pessimist, the 
iconoclast are the owls and bats of the night — their 
eyes never see the sun. It will not do to say that 
faith is but fit food for children and women; it is 
diet for strong men. 

It makes a happy home possible, since we must have 
faith, we husbands and wives, we fathers and mothers 
in a hundred things we see not and never can prove. 
Faith is the foundation of most of the business, the 
commercial business of the world. 

Some call it credit. I call it faith. What is credit 
in a man's business ? "The substance of things hoped 
for; the evidence of things not seen." That is what 
faith is. Columbus had faith, and America was found. 
Stephenson had faith, and he put steam upon wheels. 
Morse had faith, though a Congress had not, and he 
bound up the whisper of the lightning in a bit of wire 
and sent it round the world in an intelligible language. 
Faith sent the first telegram — "See what God hath 
wrought !" 

To look with the eye of faith upon the bright side 



THE SUNNY SIDE OF 1,1 FE. 197 

of things is a proof of greatness. Doubt and com- 
plaint are characteristic of littleness. John Dismal, 
a word with you: Wipe the gathered dust from the 
lenses of your spectacles of joy and faith, and look 
with unblurred vision upon the face of Nature, and 
you will see that every line and dimple, every glance 
and smile condemn in unmistakable terms all whin- 
ing and sniveling, all cynicism and doubt. What ser- 
mons of faith are not preached in wood-cathedral 
and hill-top temple ! How the winter trusts the spring, 
and the spring the summer! Today, the snow lies 
drifted; tomorrow, apple-blossoms, pink and white, 
shall tint the trees, perfume the air and deck the grass. 
Today, there may be wailing of wind and sobbing of 
storm; tomorrow, the robins will fill the orchard with 
music just as they have for a thousand years. Today, 
wrapped in a gray shroud of dead leaves, the grasses 
and the mosses lie hidden from sight; tomorrow, in 
shining green, in buds of pink and purple, they will 
smile again, just as they did when first they dropped 
from the gardens of Eternity into the fields of Time. 

Should we not have the faith of bird and bud and 
blossom? The winter may come to the soul, so shall 
the summer also. The certainty of the summer of the 
soul is as sure as the certainty of the summer of the 
seasons. There is no chance — no accident. Certainty 
is the law of life everywhere. Let us have faith. We 
may not always know just how faith shall be given 
its full fruition, but somehow in God's way it comes. 
We need the faith of little children. 

Two Irish lads, Patsy and Mike, used to peddle 
buttons and pins in the streets of London. 



198 THE SUNNY SIDE OF I<IFE. 

One day while trying to cross a crowded thorough- 
fare, Patsy's foot slipped. A great wagon passed over 
him, shattering his legs and breaking his arms. Mike 
called a policeman. Together they picked up Patsy, 
carried him to an ambulance and conveyed him to a 
hospital, where, in spite of all that skill and nursing 
could do for him, it was evident the broken lad was 
in a dying condition. The Sunday before the accident 
Patsy and Mike had been to Sunday school. They had 
drawn near the open door to listen to the sublime music 
of the organ as it crept out upon the air like the bles- 
sing of a benediction after prayer. A sweet girl near 
the door had beckoned them to go in. She talked 
lovingly with them. She told them the sweet old story 
of the passing of the Master — of the lame He made to 
walk, of the blind man who, with lifted hand, had 
pleaded for his sight; of the Master's words, "Ac- 
cording to your faith, be it unto you," and of the dark- 
ness which gave way to the miracle of light. 

"Children," she said, "we are all like that blind man. 
We stumble and grope in the dark of life, but Jesus 
is always passing by, and if we do but beckon to Him, 
if we hold up our hands and ask Him, He will hear us 
and heed us, and give us light and joy again, but we 
must have faith and hold up our hands." 

Patsy lies in the hospital, broken and dying. Mike 
kneels on the floor at his bedside. 

"Does your legs hurt you very hard, Patsy?" 

"Oh, yis, Mike — I can't stand it." 

"Wouldn't you like to go to some place where they 
wouldn't hurt you so hard?" 

"O yis, Mike — I can't stand the pain much longer/' 



THE SUNNY SIDE OE UFE. 199 

"Patsy, you know what the good girl said to us 
on the Sunday, that somebody by the name of Jesus 
was all the time a passin' by, and if we would beckon 
to him, and/hould up our hands to him, and ax him, 
He would hear us — He will hear you, Patsy, and take 
you some place where your legs wouldn't hurt you so 
hard — try that Patsy." 

"I'm afraid a grand, fine gintleman like Him 
wouldn't care anything for a boy like me that's rags 
and tears and Irish." 

"Yis he would, Patsy ; yis he would ; that's the best 
part of it; it's the rags and the tears that houlds the 
gates o' Heaven wide open for the poorest of us, Irish 
and all!" 

"I'll try, Mike." 

"Dear Patsy ! do Patsy — try ; hould up your hand." 

Patsy lifted his thin white hand, but weak and 
nerveless, it would not stay lifted — it fell down again. 

"What'll I do, Mike? I can't hould the hand up; 
prop it up with the pillows and make it stay — Jesus 
must see the hand whin he passes by — I've got the 
faith in Him. Prop it up with the pillows." 

Firmly propped with the pillows, the little lad's 
wasted hand gleamed through the night shadows of 
the hospital ward with the beautiful whiteness of a 
star. 

In the morning, when the gray old doctor of the 
hospital went his rounds, he found Mike sobbing at 
the cot-side, and he found Patsy white and dead ! There 
was a smile of ineffable sweetness upon his face, and 
the little white hand, whiter grown, was still lifted 
aloft — eloquent testimony of the faith of a little Irish 



200 THE SUNNY SIDE OF UEE. 

lad. His spirit had gone with the Master, for in the 
heart of the night He had passed by! 

God never fails. His presence and blessing come 
with human contentment, human honesty, human love, 
human hope and human faith, and the joy of His good- 
ness and the glory of His majesty are written upon 
the face of Nature everywhere. 

On the wall of my study at home, I have a picture, 
the gift of a dear old Quaker friend, who, twenty years 
agone said : "Thee lovest Nature's beautiful, thee hast 
said to me. Hang this picture on thy wall in remem- 
brance of me. It shall cheer thee when I am in the 
dust." 

A beautiful picture, a magnificent picture of the 
Falls of the Yo Sem-i-te. Yo Sem-i-te, the wonderful, 
the mighty. Yo Sem-i-te, where the water born of the 
sky and the mountain-peak leaps down as with wings 
of light for two thousand six hundred feet over the 
shining rocks ! What music ! How the notes crash 
and boom with the voice of a tropic thunder. Mar- 
velous Yo Sem-i-te. Mightiest of the Creator's tem- 
ples, where in a matchless quartette of song — thunder- 
ing bass in the crashing cataract, thrilling tenor in the 
leaping cascade, plaintive alto in the murmuring spra}r, 
and sweet soprano in the tinkling drops — voices shout 
from that lifted choir, "Thine is the Kingdom, and 
the power, and the glory," and the fingers of the wind 
sweep the harpstrings of the pine-trees with a grand 
"Amen !" 

Joy is the anthem sung by these voices. Let us find 
the key note, and join in the singing. 



BEACON LIGHTS 



OF 



MEN AND WOMEN 



Oliver Cromwell. Frederick of Prussia. Cyrus 
the Great. Alexander Dumas, the elder. Joseph 
Reed. Andrew Marvell. Abraham Lincoln. Thomas 
Brassey. A princess in the time of the Crusaders. 
Richard Cobden. Napoleon the Great. Jesus of Naz- 
areth. Demosthenes. John A. Rawlins. Wendell 
Phillips. Ralph Waldo Emerson. George Peabody. 
Daniel. Isaac Newton. Peter Cooper. Solomon. 
Savonarola. Homer. Duke of Wellington. Physi- 
cal strength of great men and women. Walter Scott. 
Napoleon Bonaparte. Jean Paul Richter. A few 
great writers. Daniel Webster. Robert Bonner. 
Witty men who were unhappy. Arbuthnot. Abra- 
ham Lincoln. Demetrius. Persistence of great men. 
Tragic fate of the disciples of Christ. Tributes of 
great men to motherhood. Some supreme historical 
names. William Pitt. Oliver Goldsmith. Ten great 
men. Agassiz. Garret homes of great men. Michael 
Faraday. Sidney Carton. Atticus. Alexander the 
Great. George Whitefield. Lady Lawrence. Great 
men not wholly perfect. Anna Scott Drysdale. 
Eloquence of Edmund Burke. Oratory of Edward 
Everett. Diogenes and Alexander. Huxley. Lincoln 
and Liberty. 



To bring out briefly and comprehensively the intellectual 
and moral ideals of these lives has required years of reading 
and reflection. These extracts are not quotations from books, 
but represent the epitomized thought of the author and are here 
given just as delivered in his lectures of the past tzventy years. 



BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 



Oliver Cromwell. His love of truth. 

Oliver Cromwell once sent to London for an artist 
to paint his portrait. The artist, young and ambi- 
tious, saw therein an opportunity for the making of 
a reputation. Cromwell was not a handsome man; 
his features were coarse, his skin red and rough, and 
covered with warts, moth-patches and hairs. The 
artist determined to make of the homely face of the 
Protector, "a thing of beauty," and straightway began 
to flatter him with his brush. When the portrait had 
sufficiently progressed to reveal the purpose of the 
painter, Cromwell became angry, and in a fit of rage, 
thundered : "Boy ! thou shalt not let thy brush lie for 
me ! Paint me just as I am — -warts, wrinkles, moth- 
patches, hairs and all !" How many of the portraits 
and photographs of to-day, are made on the Oliver 
Cromwell plan? How many of us are brave enough 
to desire and demand an honest "counterfeit present- 
ment" of ourselves? 

Frederick of Prussia. 

The courage to tell the truth is a supreme evidence 
of greatness; it is only the little men who lie. The 
Great Frederick once sent a message to the Senate 
which said: "I have just lost an important battle, and 
it was entirely my own fault." 

Cyrus the Great. 

When asked what was the great thing to learn in 
life, Cyrus, the Conqueror of Babylon, replied: "To 
tell the truth." 



204 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

Alexander Dumas, the Elder. 

Alexander Dumas, the eminent French writer and 
dramatist, was a quadroon, with dark skin and kinky 
hair. A strain of negro blood had blown across the 
Mediterranean sea, and found lodgment in his veins. 
This would not have been, had his father heard and 
heeded the prayer of Tristam Shandy: "I would my 
father had minded what he had been about when he 
begat me!" Dumas frequently felt annoyance and 
shame because of this black spot in his breeding. It 
is well when a man can say "My father was clean and 
noble; there is no stain upon my ancestral escutch- 
eon." It is better, nay, it is best when a father can 
say "My children are physically pure and clean, be- 
cause I am clean. What my father was, I cannot 
alter; what as a father, I am, is my deep concern." 

A flippant impudent dandy once sought to try the 
courage of Dumas in the matter of his ancestry. Was 
he brave enough to tell the truth concerning himself? 
The dandy adjusted his eye-glass, and with a grin of 
assurance, said to the great writer: "Pardon, Mon- 
sieur Dumas; is it true that you are a quadroon?" 

"Yes," replied the dramatist, quietly and bravely. 
"I am a quadroon." 

"Ah-ha !" sneered the dandy. "Pardon again, Mon- 
sieur Duma's; what was your father?" 

"My father, if you must know," replied the great 
man, "was a mulatto." 

"Ah-ha ! We shall get at the root of the tree pres- 
ently. Pardon again, Monsieur; no offence; what 
was your grandfather?" 



BEACON EIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 205 

"My grandfather," continued the writer, still con- 
trolling himself, "was a negro." 

"Ah-ha ! now we find you out ! Excusez moi, Mon- 
sieur! Pardonez moi! What was your great-grand- 
father?" 

"My great-grandfather," thundered Dumas, "was 
an ape ! An ape, sir ! My pedigree commences where 
yours terminates, you fool!" Cut deep as it might, 
Dumas could tell the truth. Truth makes the gentle- 
man. In spite of his ancestry, Dumas was a gentle- 
man. 

Joseph Reed. His incorruptible and unpurchaseable 
honor. 
Nations are held together, not by armies or wealth, 
or law, but by what of integrity there may be in the 
minds and hearts and deeds of thepeople. These United 
States of America could not be, but for the integrity, 
the incorruptible and unpurchaseable honor of one 
man — Joseph Reed. In the early days of our Colonial 
history, Joseph Reed was the President of our Conti- 
nental Congress. Poor, and at times in dire distress 
for want of money, food and clothing, his material 
existence was no luxurious holiday. There came a 
time of Satanic temptation to Joseph Reed. The in- 
satiate devil of British greed, in the persons of three 
Commissioners, took him into an inner room, and 
after bolting the door, one said : "Thou and thy wife 
and thy children are poor and in need; we can make 
thee and thine rich, Joseph Reed. Here are ten 
thousand guineas for thee, if thou wilt sell out these 
thirteen Colonies to the English King." 



2o6 BEACON EIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

With white lips, and features hard as iron, Joseph 
Reed replied : "True, I am poor ; my wife is not always 
well clothed, not always well-fed; my children some- 
times have gone hungry to their beds, and have 
walked shoeless in the streets ; all this is true ; but men 
of the British Commission, by the grace of the Eternal, 
your King is not rich enough to buy me 1" 

Andrew Marvell. 

In spite of scant fare, and garret lodging, Andrew 
Marvell, the brave champion lover and friend of the 
common people in the days of Charles the Second, 
could not be bought from his high ideal of truth and 
right, even by the King himself. Upon his tomb are 
chiselled these words. "Beloved by good men, feared 
by bad men, imitated by few men — Here lie the bones 
of honest Andrew Marvell." 

Abraham Lincoln. 

Born amid the wilds of Kentucky; knowing no 
books but Robinson Crusoe, Pilgrim's Progress, Con- 
stitution of the United States, the Statutes of Indiana, 
and a few leaves from an old torn Bible; given but 
two years of common cross-road country schoolhouse 
learning; ever in contact with the dirt and vice of 
frontier society, yet himself stainless as the leaf of a 
lily ; winning his way in the face of opposing difficul- 
ties and dangers, such as never before or since in the 
world's history have surrounded any man; to-day 
worth a few dollars in that he owned a flatboat on 
the Ohio river ; tomorrow bankrupt, with the boat and 
all its cargo at the river's bottom ; again tossed on the 



BEACON UGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 207 

surging fluctuating sea of popular politics, he rose as 
might the arc-angel Michael, God-sent, to the deliver- 
ance of men ; to the unselfish championship of Union 
and Freedom, when it seemed to men who considered 
themselves wise, utterly inconsistent; never losing faith 
when all was in peril, and suddenly snatched out of 
life when all had been secured ; while the sweet echoes 
of the chinking music, made by the dropping of man- 
acles from millions of poor, tired scarred black feet, 
were wafted into Heaven after him, the grandest re- 
quiem ever chanted to the memory and blessing of man 
since Christ as man bought with his blood a world's 
redemption! God crowned him, humanity's friend 
and hero; men knew him simply as honest Abraham 
Lincoln ! 

Thomas Brassey. His conception of the value of a 
contract. 
Thomas Brassey built the Barentin Viaduct of 
twenty-seven arches ; when nearly completed, and 
loaded with wet after a heavy fall of rain, it tumbled 
to pieces. He was neither morally nor legally respon- 
sible for the ruin, and his lawyers maintained that the 
law freed him from liability, but Thomas Brassey 
answered and said : "Gentlemen, I contracted to make 
and maintain the Viaduct, and the law shall not keep 
me from being as good as my word." He rebuilt the 
Viaduct at his own cost, involving to him a personal 
loss of ten thousand pounds. 

A Princess in the Time of the Crusaders Her 
love of her husband. 
A princess in the time of the Crusaders, so loved 



208 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

her husband, that when in a battle with the Turks, he 
was wounded with a poisoned arrow, and no physi- 
cian's skill could save him, she voluntarily with her 
own lips sucked the poison from the wound, knowing 
perfectly well it would cause her own death. She died ; 
her husband lived. She knew she would die, and she 
died that he might live; such is the love that is 
stronger than death. 

Richard Cobden. His work for others. 

Richard Cobden, by herculean efforts, repealed the 
unjust corn laws of England, and enabled the poor to 
eat bread, and therefore the memory of him lingers, 
to this day, in every English cottage, bright as the 
light of a star — sweet as the melody of a song. 

Napoleon the Great. His tribute to the Christ. 

Napoleon at St. Helena, said to Count Montholon: 
"Can you tell me who Jesus Christ was?" 
"No," replied Montholon. "Who was he?" 
"I will tell you who He was," said Napoleon. "Al- 
exander, Caesar, Charlemagne and myself have found- 
ed great empires, but upon what did these creations 
rest? Upon force. Jesus founded His empire upon 
love, and to-day, millions would die for Him. I have 
succeeded in drawing men unto myself — some of them 
would have died for me — but to do this, required my 
voice, my presence, my legions. Across a chasm of 
eighteen hundred years, Jesus makes a demand, which 
above all other demands is most difficult to satisfy ; He 
asks for the human heart ; He asks for it wholly, un- 
reservedly, and lo ! though He be absent, though He 
be invisible, the demand is granted. It is love alone 
which can do this." 



BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 209 

Jesus of Nazareth. An estimate of Him. 

His chief business, while on earth, was to minister 
to the welfare and the happiness of the sons and 
daughters of men. He sought out the poor and the 
.lowly. When worshipped of men, He was the hum- 
blest. When beaten of men, He was the gentlest and 
the tenderest. The purity of His life has no counter- 
part in the history of mankind. The courtesy of His 
manners has never been equalled. He never made a 
mistake. He never committed an error, and yet His 
life was filled with action, swift as the stroke of the 
wing of the lightning. His mind made every subject 
plain, and every theme transparent as glass. His 
heart went out to all manner of men, and drew all 
manner of men unto Himself. His conscience knew 
the right, and it never failed Him. He was an epitome 
of the divinity in humanity. Love filled Him; there- 
fore was Heaven in Him. Of all who ever walked the 
earth, He alone was truly wise. His is still the ideal life 
and yet two thousand years have come and gone since 
the touch of His feet hallowed, and made sacred the 
sands of the shores of Galilee. 

Jesus of Nazareth. The statement of Publius Len- 
tulus. 
In a bit of ancient manuscript, sent by Publius Len- 
tulus, the President of Judea, to the Senate of Rome, 
were written these words : "There lives at this time 
in Judea, a man of singular character. His personal 
appearance, His words and His work, are those of 
a most exalted being. His hair, in shades which no 
united colors can match, clusters in curls about His 



2IO BEACON UGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

shoulders, parting upon the crown of His head. His 
forehead is smooth and large; His eyes are clear and 
serene; His mouth and nose are formed with ex- 
quisite beauty; His cheeks are without spot, save that 
of a lovely red ; His beard is thick, and parted in the 
middle like a fork. He rebukes with majesty; coun- 
sels with mildness; persuades in language the most- 
touching and tender. No man has ever seen Him 
laugh, and yet He is seen to weep frequently, and so 
persuasive are His tears, that none can refrain from 
joining in sympathy with Him. He is persistent in 
all well-doing. He heals the sick, restores sight to 
the blind, and hearing to the deaf, and often without 
word or touch. He is endowed with such marvellous 
power, as to be able to call back the dead from their 
graves. His love is as the light of the sun, and it is 
vouchsafed to the poorest and meanest of men. The 
power of truth is in His every utterance and His every 
act. His followers are the common people, and they 
hear Him gladly ; they adore Him. I learn as I write 
to you that He is only the son of a carpenter, and that 
His name is Jesus of Nazareth." Note. — "What is a 
man worth?" one of the author's most valuable and 
famous lectures is based upon this writing of Publius 
Lentulus. 

Demosthenes. How he lost his hold upon men. 

When Demosthenes accepted a gold cup from one 
of the chiefs of Alexander, for the delivery of an ora- 
tion, in defiance of the right, and in opposition to the 
dictates of his conscience, his eloquent voice became 
as an empty sound, and the sceptre of his power a 
thing of dust beneath his feet. 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 211 

John A. Rawlins. How he showed his friendship 
for Gen. Grant. 

In the month of June, 1863, under the guns of 
Vicksburg, a man of wonderful sagacity, unusual re- 
ticence and indomitable perseverance, held in the hol- 
low of his hand the fate of this nation. Centered in 
him were forces of character, sufficient to lift him to 
the divinest height of a magnificent manhood. Every 
gift and power necessary for a great purpose were 
his. But all these splendid qualities were being per- 
verted to base uses by the foulest enemy of mankind 
— drunkenness. Samson was losing his strength. The 
eagle, with power to sweep to the mountain height, 
began to flutter as with broken wing. A friend, lov- 
ing this man, with faith in his mighty possibilities, in 
his tent at midnight, penned and sent to him this brave 
letter: 

"My dear General: — The deep solicitude I feel for 
the welfare of this army leads me to mention, what 
I had hoped never again to do, namely, the subject 
of your drinking. I learn that Dr. Macmillan at Gen- 
eral Sherman's last night induced you, notwithstand- 
ing your pledge to me, to drink a glass of wine; and 
today, when I found a box of wine in front of your 
tent, which I ordered removed, I was told that you 
had forbidden such removal, as you intended to keep 
it until you entered Vicksburg, that you might drink 
it with your friends. Had you not early last March 
given me the promise of your honor that you would 
drink no more during the war, and had you not faith- 
fully kept that promise during your recent campaign, 
you would not now stand before the world as one of 



212 BEACON WGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

its leading military chieftains. Your only hope of ul- 
timate success lies in your fidelity to the pledge made 
to me; you cannot hope to win in any other way. 
When one sees a sentinel asleep at his post, it is his 
duty to arouse him ; and when one sees the commander 
of a great army taking such steps in the line of his 
moral duty, as will jeopardize the safety and welfare 
of that army, if he fails to sound a proper note of 
warning, the sisters, daughters, wives and mothers 
of the brave boys whose lives he permits to be thus 
imperiled, will accuse him while he lives, and stand 
swift ministers of wrath against him in the great 
eternal day when all shall be tried. Let my friend- 
ship for you, and my love for my country, be my 
excuse for this letter, and if you fail to heed my prayer 
in this regard, let my removal from duty in this de- 
partment be the result. I am, dear General, your 
friend, John A. Rawlins." Kindly received, and 
faithfully heeded were these brave words, and across 
the stormy sky of war the rescued chieftain flung the 
flag of freedom, and held it aloft through clouds of 
smoke, seas of fire and rains of blood, until the sun 
of peace kissed his brow at the Appomattox Court 
House ! 

Wendell Phillips. An illustration of his wit. 

While engaged in the pursuit of his anti-slavery 
work, Wendell Phillips was not always understood, 
nor did he receive universal sympathy; the press and 
even the pulpit frequently antagonized him. One 
day a minister of the gospel met the great agitator 
on Tremont street, Boston, and after accosting him, 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 213 

said, "Pardon me, Mr. Phillips, but what is the exact 
nature of your work in the world?" "My work in 
the world," replied Mr. Phillips, "is to save the negro." 
"Ah ! precisely ; why, then, do you not go down South, 
where the negro is, and do it and not stop here loafing 
round Boston?" "Pardon me," said the agitator, 
"but may I have the pleasure of asking you a ques- 
tion?" "Oh, certainly," responded the minister; 
"what is it?" "What is your work in the world?" 
"My work in the world," continued the minister, "is 
as you doubtless are aware, to save souls from hell." 
"Precisely," responded Mr. Phillips ; "then why do 
you not go there and do it, and not stop here loafing 
round Boston?" 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. The equanimity of his 
temper. 

Upon one occasion, Mr. Emerson was invited to 
deliver an address before the congregation of an or- 
thodox church. His remarks were characterized by 
the mystical habit of thought peculiar to him, and 
were along metaphysical lines. When he had finished, 
a prayer was offered by a thoroughly orthodox brother, 
who, among other things, said, "O Lord, may we 
never again be compelled to listen to such transcen- 
dental nonsense as that which this morning has been 
delivered in Thy house!" 

As the congregation were departing from the place, 
Mr. Emerson said to a friend, "What is the name of 
the good brother who made the prayer?" It was 
given, and the philosopher continued, "He seems to be 
a very sincere and conscientious man!" 



214 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

George Peabody. His aversion to lordly distinction 
and titles. 

George Peabody, the banker-philanthropist, gave 
millions to the grinding poor of London, that palsied 
limbs might be strong again, and sinking hearts rise 
again, and white lips glow as the rose again; that 
the toilers who labor as those who toil for crime, 
might have each day an hour all their own, for books 
and friends and flowers, and blue sky and bits of 
bonny woodland, and the Queen said, "Well done! 
I will make thee, George Peabody, a royal knight of 
the Order of the Bath." 

Did he bow and smile and bend the knee, and say, 
"Most gracious Majesty, I thank thee and accept ?" 
No ! He answered simply, "My plain American citi- 
zenship is royalty enough for me!" 

Daniel. The courage of his righteousness. 

Daniel was the prime minister of a hundred prov- 
inces, and the ruler over a hundred princes, and his 
fame was great throughout all Babylon; but even 
these were in the hands of a king whose merest whim 
might depose and silence even Daniel. He was a 
statesman, upon whose administration there was not 
flaw or stain, but malice was upon his track, and envy, 
a thing though blind, seeing spots upon the sun, 
skulked in his shadow. All his acts were brought into 
unfriendly review, and a decree went forth that for 
the space of thirty days no petition should be offered 
to God or man save to the majesty of the King. The 
righteous courage of Daniel was on trial. He had 
everything to lose. Did he yield? Night came. He 



BEACON EIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 215 

opened his window toward Jerusalem, as he was ever 
wont to do. He fell upon his knees. Fear whis- 
pered "Is it safe?" Policy hinted "Is it expedient?" 
Vanity urged "Will it be popular?" 

His enemies listened waiting beneath his window. 
He reads the Word. He voices a hymn of praise. His 
soul goes out in prayer, just as it had for seventy 
years. His enemies crowd into his apartment, and 
accuse him of violating the king's decree, but Daniel 
faltered not, and with calm courage entered the pit of 
the beasts prepared for his punishment. His enemies 
rejoiced in their triumph, and waited through the 
night that they might gather up his broken bones in 
the morning, but the Hand omnipotent held him in 
its all-protecting hollow. With the dawn of the day 
the king hastened to the door of the pit, and cried 
aloud, "Daniel, servant of the living God, is thy God 
whom thou servest able to keep thee from the lions ?" 
And Daniel replied, "O king, live forever!" 

Sir Isaac Newton. His tenacity of conviction. 

After announcing his sublime discovery of the law 
of gravitation, and challenged to make answering de- 
nial by the ignorant and superstitious of his time, 
Newton, simple, pure and brave, the whitest soul of 
his day, answered, "Gentlemen, I cannot; for look 
you, the apple falls from the tree just the same." 

Peter Cooper. The Philanthropist. 

When a man, worn and tired out with ninety years 
of patient and unselfish work for men, goes home, 
passes the eternal gates in answer to the gentle voice 
of the Father infinite, and all the hearts in the great 



2l6 BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

city that knew him stand still a moment, the eyes 
moisten, the lips tremble with tender words for him, 
dead in the coffin there, and even the servant grown 
gray in his service, dies for the loss of him — the life 
of that man must have been beautiful — nay, it was 
heroic. 

Solomon. Was he wise? 

Poet, philosopher, naturalist and charming singer 
of songs, Solomon, in genius was a colossus, but in 
character, a pigmy. How beautiful and wise his 
words ! How repulsive and foolish his deeds ! How 
sure and relentless the iron logic of every sequence 
growing out of his deeds ! What a reflection, that 
he of all men should sum up the estimate of life, 
with a dirge of despair ! "Vanity of vanities !" And 
yet, could aught else have been possible to Solomon, 
the Solomon of history, the Solomon of fact? Weary 
and wasted with the satiety of passion, and with every 
self-indulgence the world can bestow, he set at de- 
fiance every practice, if not principle of virtue. He 
wallowed in the mire of a seraglio, crowded with seven 
hundred wives, and three hundred mistresses, whose 
influence was so evil that he welcomed idolatrous wor- 
ship, and consecrated to the obscene deities of neigh- 
boring nations a portion of one of the hills overlooking 
Jerusalem, a spot of surpassing loveliness, fronting 
the matchless temple he had erected to the God of the 
Universe. The broken monuments of his carer were 
an insecure throne, a discontented people, enemies on 
every hand and a contested succession. Of all mon- 
archs, Solomon was the most magnificent, and yet in 



BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 217 

his brief reign of forty years, he so lived as to destroy 
forever the power and the glory of the Jewish empire.. 
Solomon lived for pleasure, and when pleasure reigns 
supreme knowledge and affection and goodness must 
decay. Were I asked to write an epitaph for the tomb 
of Solomon, and commanded to be honest. I should be 
compelled to write.. ''Here lies a fool !" And why 
should I say fool? Because pleasure is always the 
assassin of intellect, of love, of conscience. No man. 
be he who he may, can dance the years of life away 
to the music of timbrel and harp, and not hear at the 
last the broken tones of the discord of hell; no man, 
be he who he may. can live his life out with his head 
in the lap of a Delilah, and escape at the last the clutch 
upon his throat of the fingers of a Jezebel ! Solomon 
tried it and failed. — From the author's lecture enti- 
tled "Wisdom's Jeweled Ring." 

Savonarola. His denunciation of immorality in a 
cultured age. 
The cultivation of the intellect is not sufficient for 
the development of the moral life. The most mag- 
nificently intellectual age in Italian history was that 
under Lorenzo the Great, sometimes called "the Mag- 
nificent.'* There never was a time, however, in all 
Italian history, when men and women, and even boys 
and girls, were so low and vile, so thoroughly immoral 
as they were under the artistic and cultured Lorenzo. 
and against the moral rot and filth and damnation of 
that time were hurled the sublime thunders of the 
righteous wrath of brave Savonarola. 



2l8 BEACON UGHTS OF MSN AND WOMEN. 

Homer. His tribute to the power of silence. 

"Silence," said Homer, "is the only thing which can 
prevent and defeat understanding." If you would 
hold a wholly unassailable and impregnable position 
on any given question, keep silent. "Speaking is sil- 
ver ; silence is gold ;' this is an old and wise saying. 

Duke of Wellington. His physical health and 
strength. 

Success in life is largely a matter of health and 
strength; health and strength afford endurance, and 
success is largely a question of endurance. He who 
because of physical power can stand the most kicks 
and thumps at the heels and fists of life will generally 
come out conqueror. While watching the boys at play 
on the grounds of Eton College, the Duke of Welling- 
ton said to a friend, "It was here that the battle of 
Waterloo was won." The sports of youth laid the 
foundation of the later endurance of manhood. 

Physical Strength of Great Men and Women. 

The successful men and women of history have been 
with rare exceptions the possessors of perfect health 
and sound, strong bodies. Socrates, Plato, Alexan- 
der, Caesar, Cicero, Virgil, Shakespeare, Bacon, Hum- 
boldt, Napoleon, Washington, Adams, Webster, Lin- 
coln, Cleopatra, Semiramis, Zenobia, Catherine Sec- 
ond, Elizabeth, Mary Somerville, Harriet Martineau, 
Rosa Bonheur, Charlotte Cushman, Harriet Beecher, 
and, indeed, the kings and queens of life everywhere 
have been characterized by marked physical power. 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 219 

Walter Scott. A veritable athlete. 

Sir Walter Scott, the most prolific of Scotland's 
writers, was a perfect athlete. While writing the 
Waverley novels, he devoted the morning to his pen, 
and in the afternoon he hunted rabbits or fished in 
the mountain streams. No man could ride a wild 
horse like Scott. When his head was crowned with 
the snows of eighty winters, the sunlight still shone 
in his eyes, and the roses still blossomed in the red of 
his cheeks. 

Napoleon Bonaparte. A man of motive and energy. 
The attainment of any great end depends primarily 
upon the possession of a motive, and secondarily upon 
uncompromising persistence and unswerving alleg- 
iance in the pursuit of that motive. When a boy at 
school, storming forts of snow, and leading an attack 
of boys, armed with snowballs for ammunition, with 
a red pocket-handkerchief for a battle-flag, Napoleon 
often said, "It is the motive of my life to be a great 
soldier." He might have lain upon his back, listening 
to the crooning songs of the grasses, and dreaming of 
the soldier's plume and cross of honor for a century, 
and remained nothing but the musing dreamer, but all 
his life was a magnificent embodiment of his favorite 
maxim, "The truest genius is uncompromising per- 
sistence." Energy, , action, persistence, toil, will and 
enormous self-confidence were the Napoleonic virtues. 
"The Alps stand in the way of your armies," said one ; 
"you cannot get into Italy." "There shall be no Alps," 
said Napoleon, and lo! his armies stand beneath Ital- 
ian skies. Napoleon gave the world a key with which 



220 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

to unlock the door of the temple of success, when he 
said to his brother, King Joseph of Spain, "Be mas- 
ter!" 

Jean Paul Richter. The relative place of wit and 
wisdom. 
"Wit," said Richter, "should fill only the chinks of 
life ; wisdom should cover the great spaces." 

A Few Great Writers. To be familiar with them, 
is to have a complete and rounded education. 
It would be impossible to read all the books of the 
world — even the good books, nor is it necessary. The 
volumes and manuscripts in the Imperial library of 
Paris alone would require three thousand years for 
their reading at the rate of a volume a day. There is 
more danger in reading too much than in reading too 
little. We should know and above all understand 
not something of everything, but everything of some- 
thing. A half dozen writers, such as Lyell, Nicoll, 
Mitchell, Mrs. Somerville, Lardner and Guyot, will 
furnish a full acquaintance with the physical world in 
which we live. Lyell, in his "Elements and principles 
of Geology," will explain the formation and nature of 
the earth's floor. Guyot's "Earth and Man" will tell us 
of the situation and extent of the floor. Linneus and 
Gray will show us how beautiful and wonderful is the 
carpet of the earth, woven of the grasses and flowers. 
Mitchell in his "Lectures on the Phenomena of the 
Heavens" will instruct and fascinate with pictures of 
the ceiling of the earth, and of its star-fretted fres- 
coes. Grote, Gibbon, Carlyle, Macauley, Bancroft and 
Prescott are sufficient for all needed knowledge of the 



BEACON RIGHTS OE MEN AND WOMEN. 221 

struggles and sorrows, the rights the wrongs, 
the triumphs and failures of peoples and na- 
tions on the wide landscape of history. Homer, 
Shakespeare, Tennyson, and Whittier will af- 
ford all that is needful of the inspiration and 
the music of poetic song, from the stirring 
tones of the trumpet of Jupiter, to the tender sweet- 
ness of Apollo's harp-strings ; from the thunder of the 
tramping of armies, and through every transaction of 
human concernment to the gentlest melodies of the hu- 
man heart. Emerson has much of the best of the sub- 
tlest, the wisest and the most inspiring of the purest 
and sweetest of the ideal philosophy of life and na- 
ture. He is the later and simpler Plato. Dickens 
and Scott, Hugo and Thackeray, George Eliot and 
Hawthorne are among the laurel-crowned masters of 
fiction. If you would go with your soul as near to 
God as souls can go, this side Chiron's river of shadow, 
touch no volume of man's theology, agonize over no 
books of doctrine or dogma — simply read the Bible ; 
it is the only book in which may be seen facsimiles of 
the hand-writing of God, and in the rustle and whis- 
per of whose pages may be heard hushed echoes of His 
voice ! 

Daniel Webster. How he made opportunities. 

A common plea for ignorance, illiteracy and even 
practical failure in life, is the trite one of adverse cir- 
cumstances or lack of opportunity. "Circumstances 
are against me, and therefore I cannot be anybody," is 
a very common cry. "I make circumstances," said 
Napoleon. "I cannot find food for my family," said 



222 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

an idler. "Neither can I," said a worker, "I have to 
earn it !" Circumstances do not make us ; they only 
reveal us. Waterloo revealed Wellington; it did not 
create him. Had he been an arrant coward, or an in- 
competent cypher, a thousand Waterloos could not 
have made him the Wellington of history. A fool 
cannot profit by a great occasion. "Circumstances are 
against us ; opportunities are unfavorable" — these are 
the breastworks behind which skulk the timid and in- 
competent soldiers of the armies of mankind. These 
are very weak cries, very transparent excuses. Sift 
it, and you will find that "lack of opportunity" means 
lack of patience, of energy, of self-denial. What op- 
portunity had Daniel Webster for obtaining an edu- 
cation? What favorable circumstance had he? Shut 
in by the almost impenetrable wildness of nature's 
riotous tangle in the hills of New Hampshire, where 
could he turn? But he would have an education. He 
held up his brain and heart to the cheering words of 
his mother, as a flower lifts its head to catch the sun- 
light and the dew, with faith in a full fruition. He 
walked miles to and from a country cross-road school- 
house. He copied legal deeds and instruments. He 
did "chores" for a pittance. He fought every inch of 
the way up the stony hills of knowledge and success, 
and he won. Won, not so much because he had the 
brains, but because he had the energy. No amount of 
brains can make any two-legged animal a man, with- 
out energy. 

Daniel Webster. He believed nothing to be im- 
possible. 
The day came for laying the top stone on Bunker 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 223 

Hill monument. It was one of the nation's white 
days. The brightest and best of America gathered 
on that historic hill, glory-crowned with a hundred 
memories, to witness the crowning of its granite In 
Memoriam. Thousands surged up the hill, as waves 
surge up the shore of a sea, when the scorpion whips 
of a tempest drive them. Every man present, deter- 
mined to secure the closest view of the orator. Every 
man struggled to stand nearest the tones of the voice 
of the matchless Webster. The scene was one of mad 
tumult. In vain the master of ceremonies cried out 
"Gentlemen, you must fall back !" He might as well 
have shaken a reed at an on-coming storm. The 
struggling mass of men still surged up the hill, till 
in their mad impetuosity, they broke the line of the 
military, dashed their muskets down, and trampled 
hundreds to the earth. Finally, Mr. Webster stepped 
forward, and shouted, "Gentlemen, you must fall 
back !" A thousand voices answered, "It is impossi- 
ble !" Raising his arm and his voice, while his great 
black eyes flashed the fire of the lightning, he cried 
out, "Nothing is impossible to Americans on Bunker 
Hill !" An answering shout rent the heavens, a shout 
that made the old hill rock, and the monument tremble, 
and as waves roll back to the sea, so the gathered 
thousands fell back, moved by the mighty memories 
recalled by Webster's words. 

Robert Bonner. His remarkable pluck. 

In 1853 Robert Bonner bought the "Merchant's 
Ledger," a somewhat feeble publication; it was said 
to be on its last legs. He paid nine hundred dollars 



224 BKACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

for it. As the "Merchant's Ledger/' it did not stand 
well with the people. He changed the name to that 
of "The New York Ledger." He knew that obscurity 
meant ruin. He had a plan upon which he proposed 
to run his paper. It was "Get something worth ad- 
vertising, and advertise it for all it is worth." Fanny 
Fern was then at the height of her popularity. Bon- 
ner said to her, "I will pay you twenty-five dollars a 
column if you will contribute one column per week 
for my "Ledger." The offer was refused. "I will 
pay you fifty dollars per column." Again Fanny Fern 
said "No." "I will pay you seventy-five dollars." "I 
cannot afford to write for so small a price," was the 
reply; I admire your pluck, young man, and I will 
make you a proposition. I will write for you a story 
of eleven columns for one thousand dollars." "Ac- 
cepted," said Mr. Bonner. His faith in his enterprise 
did not end here. He had secured something worth 
advertising, and he now proposed to advertise it for 
all it was worth. He expended two thousand dollars 
in an advertisement setting forth the fact that Fanny 
Fern, the most gifted woman in America, would short- 
ly begin in the columns of Bonner's "New York 
Ledger" a story of absorbing interest and unequaled 
beauty." All this consumed what money he had. He 
awaited the issue. It came in the shape of a triumph. 
Bonner's "New York Ledger" was a financial success. 

Witty Men Who Were Unhappy. 

The wits of the world as a rule have not been joy- 
ous men. Jonathan Swift, perhaps the greatest of 
them all, was a sad man; indeed, he was in many 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 225 

things a bad man, if not a mad man. He blighted the 
hopes of two beautiful women, Stella and Vannessa, 
if he did not rob at least one of them of honor. Swift 
died like "a poisoned rat in a hole," mad in a hospital. 
Moliere, whose mimicry was riotously comic, and wit 
ludicrous to the last degree, was a melancholy man. 
Burton, whose "Anatomy of Melancholy" stamps him 
as the wit philosophic, par excellence, in his chamber 
was mute and mopish. We are too apt to confound wit 
with humor. They are very different qualities. Wit 
is of the head ; it is intellectual ; the head is cold ; no 
man is so cold as the man who is wholly intellectual. 
Humor is of the heart; the heart is warm. Wit cuts 
and bruises, and hurts ; it leaves a jagged wound be- 
hind it; it may be smooth and beautiful, but it is like 
the lightning — a blazing scimetar of fire, demolishing 
what it strikes. Some one suffers when the wit is 
abroad the land, that the rest may laugh; hence the 
wit seldom or never makes a friend. He creates 
amusement at some sufferer's expense, and wounds 
some victim's feelings. The humorist is kindly and 
tender, and always considerate of the feelings of oth- 
ers. He prefers to suffer himself, rather than have 
any suffer because of his words. He never makes an 
enemy. Men love the humorist. The wit is the cre- 
ator of shadow, the generator of storm. The humor- 
ist scatters sunshine, and is the harbinger of fair 
weather. Humorists are happy. Wits, of necessity, 
are unhappy. Happiness neither dwells in nor ema- 
nates from the mind of him who shoots the arrows of 
bitterness. Wits are of the order of Belzebub. 
Humorists are loved of God, who wills that all men 
shall be glad. 



226 BEACON UGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

Arbuthnot. He wrote an honest epitaph. 

Upon the tomb of Francis Charteris, the wealthy 
but typical reprobate of the eighteenth century, 
Arbuthnot caused to be carven the following epitaph : 
"Here continueth to rot the body of Francis Charteris, 
who persisted, in spite of age and infirmity, in the 
practice of every vice except prodigality and hypo- 
crisy. His avarice exempted him from the first; his 
matchless impudence from the second. Think not, 
indignant reader, that his life was useless to mankind. 
God connived at his execrable designs, to give to after 
ages a conspicuous proof and example of how small 
estimation in His sight is exorbitant wealth, by thus 
bestowing it upon the meanest of all mortals." 

Abraham Lincoln. His paramount thought was 
the maintenance of the Union. 
When Lincoln met Hunter and Campbell and Ste- 
phens, the distinguished Confederate peace commis- 
sioners, at Hampton Rhodes, there was very much 
talk ; very many words were in the air. In the white- 
hot heart of Lincoln burned the fire of one great fact ; 
it was, that the Union, as expressed in our country, 
had cost all of the best that the world had done for six 
thousand years, and that fact must be saved. The six 
thousand years must not be rolled back, and lived over 
again. When the talk had ended, and the words had 
died away, Mr. Lincoln said: "Gentlemen, you may 
say what you will, and write what you will upon this 
peace compact, but you must write Union at the top 
of it." 



BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 227 

Demetrius. Great in words, but greater in deeds. 

Demetrius took Athens by assault, and delivered 
to the people a speech full of eloquent and heroic 
phrases. He succeeded only in causing the people to 
hate him the more. He observed that they were in 
great distress for want of corn, and he placed 'a large 
supply of grain at their disposal. The people began 
to admire him. Again he delivered a speech, full of 
tenderness, full of conciliation. An Athenian scholar, 
who listened, criticised him, and pointed out defects 
of grammar. Demetrius had not fully won the people. 
"For this correction," said Demetrius, "I add to my 
former gift five thousand measures of corn more!" 
Then it was that the people loved him. 

Persistence of Great Men. 

Why did Newton succeed? Because he pored over 
his books and his problems till the wind of the mid- 
night blew the ashes of his extinguished fire all over 
his books and papers, warning him of the lateness of 
the hour and the need of rest. 

Why did Reynolds become the greatest portrait 
painter of England? Because he often toiled with his 
pencil for thirty-six hours together. 

What has made the poet Dryden immortal? The 
dauntless spirit of persistence which enabled him to 
labor at his lines in a veritable frenzy, heedless of pri- 
vations which he did not even perceive. 

The Faith of Great Men in the Work of Their 
Lives. 
But for his faith in the value and need of his work, 
Martin Luther would not have written seven hundred 



228 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

and fifteen books; George Whitefield would not have 
traversed England, Ireland and Scotland, and crossed 
the Atlantic thirteen times to preach the word and 
the cause of the Christ ; John Howard would not have 
entered haunts of poverty and disease, watched over 
sick and dying criminals, and plunged into clammy 
dungeons, where madness and death held the red car- 
nivals of hell until his life went out upon the altar of 
his grand philanthrophy, and at the foot of the cross 
of his sublime sacrifice. 

Tragic Fate of the Disciples of Christ. 

Matthew was slain in a city of Ethiopia. Mark 
was dragged through the streets of Alexandria until 
he expired. Luke was hanged from an olive tree in 
Greece. James the Great was beheaded at Jerusalem. 
James the Less was thrown from the pinnacle of a 
temple and dashed to pieces-. Philip was beheaded. 
Bartholemew was skinned alive. Jude was shot 
through with arrows. Thomas was impaled upon a 
lance. Barnabas was stoned to death. Peter was cru- 
cified with his head downwards, and Paul was be- 
headed by the successor of Nero. There is not in all 
the records of crime, since the fratricide of Cain, a 
writing-down of the unrighteous inhumanity of the 
enemies of Truth so black as this, so unjustifiable as 
this, so unforgiveable as this, and the Nemesis of Di- 
vine vengeance has followed in the footsteps of these 
wrongs, not with blow for blow, and blood for blood, 
not with death for death, for the Christ Himself would 
not have it so, but with the perpetuation and the dis- 
semination of the truths these disciples taught, until 



BEACON IvIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 229 

today the eyes of four hundred millions look to them 
for strength and hope, and the soul's salvation ! 
Tributes of Great Men to Motherhood. 

"A true mother," said Napoleon, "is the best of 
education." Emerson said : "A mother is the measure 
of civilization." John Randolph testified, "But for the 
memory of her who taught me in the twilight to lisp 
at her knee, 'Our Father which art in Heaven.' I 
should have been an atheist." 
Some Supreme Historical Names. 

If we were asked to mention some of the greatest 
characters of history, we should not say Pharaoh, and 
Alexander, and Nero, and Napoleon, and Voltaire; 
we should say Moses, and Plato, and Luther and 
Shakespeare, and Washington, and Whittier, and 
Lincoln, and Jesus of Nazereth — He who by his word 
and work for men has drawn all men unto him, is su- 
preme in the kingdom of character. 

Pitt, Prime Minister of England. The quality 
most needed by a Prime Minister. 
Once in the presence of Mr. Pitt, the conversation 
turned upon the qualities most needed in a prime 
minister. One speaker said "Eloquence," another 
said "knowledge," a third said "labor." Gentlemen, 
said Mr. Pitt, "it is patience." It is said that through- 
out all his life, Mr. Pitt never once lost the control 
of his temper. 

Oliver Goldsmith. At once, an inspiration and a 

warning. 

Oliver Goldsmith was the most natural genius of 

his time. His "Deserted Village," all in all, is the 

finest poem; his "Vicar of Wakefield," the most ex- 



230 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

quisite novel ; and his play of "She Stoops to Con- 
quer," the most delightful comedy in the English 
language. Nevertheless, he was an extravagant, im- 
pulsive, blundering man. He lacked self-containment 
and continuity of effort, and in every direction in 
which the powers of the man and not the genius were 
requisite, he failed. As a student at Trinity College, 
he was lazy and irregular, and quitted his studies in 
disgust. He wandered from Dublin to Cork, idling 
about until he was penniless, and saved from absolute 
hunger at the hands of a generous-hearted Irish girl, 
who at a wake gave him a handful of peas to eat, the 
flavor of which remained sweet forever in his memory. 
He began the study of law, but squandered the money 
which had been given him to pursue his course at the 
gaming table. He attempted the mastery of medicine, 
continued in its consideration a few months, but failed 
to take a degree. For nearly a year he wandered on 
foot throughout Europe, half ragged, half hungry, yet 
revelling in a perfect paradise of fancies and dreams, 
and rich only in the abundant stores of his kindly 
nature, and the tender melody of his magic flute. He 
died in great pecuniary embarrassment. His last 
words, when asked by a physician if his mind was at 
ease, were, "No, it is not." 

Ten Great Men. Exemplifications of the ten essen- 
tial principles of perfect character, to-wit: ex- 
perience, knowledge, power, strength, action, zeal, 
reason, justice, mercy and virtue. 
Experience towers like a monument in the herculean 
figure of Moses, Prophet and legislator, there is no 
experience in all the wide sweep of Time, comparable 
to his journeyings of forty years through the wilder- 
ness to the Promised Land. In the desert of Thoran, 
through the parted waters of the Red Sea, amid the 



BEACON EIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 23I 

lightnings of Sinai, and from the summit of Pisgah, 
he molded the minds and hearts of men, and for one 
hundred and twenty years walked with the Jehovah! 
Knowledge finds its supreme embodiment in Hum- 
boldt. All nature was his. He studied it in all its 
moods, its minuteness, its vastness, accumulating 
treasures of knowledge, and beautifully displaying 
their connection and unity in one grand whole. His 
was the grandest cosmography, involving as its con- 
sequence the ideas of Universal Mind and Supreme 
Intelligence. 

Power attained its ultimate in the mighty Ceasar. 
He was at once soldier, statesman, scholar, poet, law- 
giver, architect and mathematician, uniting therefore 
in himself forces at once comprehensive, wide-reach- 
ing and well-nigh universal. Armies and empires 
were ground to dust beneath the iron of his heel. 
History is content to present him in his own almost 
omnipotent words : "I came, I saw, I conquered." 

Strength reached a climax in the mighty faith, the 
patience and the long-suffering of Job, whose trust in 
the goodnes and the wisdom of God, perpetuated his 
soul in love as a garden keeps and glorifies a flower. 

Action, swift to perform, on fire to sweep to its 
labor, blazed like a meteor in the burning soul of Saul 
of Tarsus. 

Zeal reached the pinnacle of the temple of character, 
in Martin Luther. All the world trembled when the 
thunders and lightnings of Luther's righteous wrath 
rumbled and flashed throughout Europe. Zeal is of 
the soul, and not of the mouth. "God hurries and 
drives me," said Martin Luther. 

In the personality of rugged Socrates, Reason finds 
its highest representation. If, according to Emerson, 
Plato was philosophy, and philosophy Plato," then 



232 BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

was philosophy Socrates, since Plato was the pupil of 
Socrates, and without Socrates there could have been 
no Plato. 

Justice blossomed into the full splendor of an aloe, 
in Abraham Lincoln, whose heart, though as wide as 
the sky and as deep as the sea, was too small for the 
dwelling-place of oppression. Within its throbbing 
walls he placed his country and on its door he wrote 
with his blood, "This is a land where every man has a 
right to be equal with every other man !" 

In the character of tender-hearted humanity-help- 
ing John Howard is embodied to an unsurpassed de- 
gree the sublime principle of Mercy. When a pris- 
oner with diseased limbs and reeling brain gasped for 
breath in the noisome vapors of some foul dungeon, 
it was John Howard who flung wide the prison doors 
and let the sweet air and the smile of the sunlight 
through. 

Virtue, the amaranthine wreath of all the ten prin- 
ciples, sat upon the brow of the meek and lowly Jesus 
of Nasereth. Throughout the march of the centuries 
He alone wears Virtue's spotless crown. Hear Him: 
"Blessed are the pure in heart ;" "Forgive us our tres- 
pases as we forgive those who trespass against us ;" 
"Get thee behind me Satan ;" "Forgive them, for they 
know not what they do;" "A new commandment I 
give unto you ,that ye love one another !" 

Moses, Humboldt, Ceasar, Job, Saul of Tarsus, 
Martin Luther, Socrates, John Howard, Abraham 
Lincoln, Jesus of Nazareth. 

Agassiz. He valued scientific research more than 
money. 
When Agassiz was offered an enormous price to 
lecture, he declined, saying: "I have no time to earn 
money." There was not time enough in life, as he 
viewed it for anything outside his scientific research; 
money he valued not. Ideas are worth more than 
money to great men. 



BEACON LIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 233 

Garret Homes of Great Men. 

How many garrets have been glorified by the pres- 
ence of the great and good of mankind ! Hayden grew 
up in one, and Chatterton starved in another. Addi- 
son and Goldsmith wrote in them, and Faraday and 
DeOuincey knew them well. Johnson dreamed sweetly 
in one, and Dickens passed his youth in one. Hans 
Christian Anderson, the fairy king, the dreamer and 
fashioner of sweet fancies, the friend of the children ; 
and Collins and Franklin: and Burns and Hogarth 
and Chantrey knew them, and made sacred every cob- 
web and broken pane and damp rat hole in them ! 

Michael Faraday. His faith in an immortal future. 
Upon one occasion, while addressing a class of stu- 
dents, Faraday, the great natural philosopher said : 
''High as man is placed above the creatures around 
him, there is yet a higher and more exalted position 
within his view, and the ways are infinite in which 
he exercises his thoughts and hopes and expectations 
of a future life. Let no one suppose for a moment. 
that the self-education I commend with relation to 
the things of this life, extends to any consideration 
of the hope set before us. It may be realized by no 
effort of our own, but can be obtained only through 
faith in the testimony given, since no man by reason- 
ing can find out God." 

The Tributes of Great Men to Friendship. 

Emerson said of Friendship: "It is like immortal- 
ity, almost too good to be believed." Plato said: "I 
would rather have one true friend, than all the treas- 
ures and delights of Darius." Cicero said: "Neither 
water, fire, nor the air we breathe is more necessary 
to us than friendship." Zenophon said : "Friendship's 
perfection is the zenith of human endowment." Jer- 
emy Taylor testified : "Friendship is that by which 
the world is most blessed, and receives most good." 
Homer touched everv string of the lute of life, and 



234 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

sweet above its every melody, sang this measure : "O ! 
every sacred name in one, my friend!" 

Sidney Carton. A true friend. 

In the red days of the French Revolution, when the 
skies seemed to rain blood, Sidney Carton entered the 
prison cell of his friend Charles Darnay, and sending 
him to his home, his wife and child, went in his stead 
to the block. In his youth, he had learned to love and 
still loved the wife of Charles Darnay, sweet Lucy 
Manette. With her husband's head beneath the knife 
of the guillotine, she might still be his. Friendship 
prevailed over love, and Carton gave back to her the 
husband she had chosen. They said of him in the city 
of Paris, as he lay dead in his coffin, that his was the 
most peaceful face man ever beheld. Hundreds whis- 
pered through their tears, "He is sublime ! He is 
prophetic ! He is heroic ! He was the friend of 
Charles Darnay." 

Atticus. By friendship he saved his country. 

Atticus of ancient Rome, when he saw that the de- 
signs of all parties tended to the subversion of liberty 
by preserving the esteem and affection of both com- 
petitors, was able to save the commonwealth from de- 
struction. 

Alexander the Great. Friendship the redeeming 
quality of his character. 
Above even his thirst for fame, the friendship of 
Alexander for Hephestion was paramount. He alone 
of all men, was Alexander willing to meet on equal 
terms. Every secret of Alexander's was Hephes- 
tion's. It was at his urging, that Alexander went 
forth to the East, to make Hellenic civilization the 
common possession of the world. His grief at the 
death of his friend, exceeded even the measure of 
reason. He ordered the manes and tails of all the 
horses of his realm to be cut off in sign of mourning. 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 235 

He would not permit the flute, or any other instrument 
of music to be played throughout his camps. He 
crucified the physician who had failed to save Heph- 
estion's life. He offered the entire male population of 
a conquered tribe as a sacrifice to his departed spirit, 
and even undertook the carving of Mount Athos into 
a mighty statue of the man who had been his friend. 
The death of Hephestion was the beginning v of the 
downfall of Alexander. His friend had been his equi- 
librium and his safeguard. Alexander grew restless, 
suspicious and timid, and harassed and broken heart- 
ed, he died. 

George Whitefield. His marvelous eloquence. 

Wonderful Whitefield! Coming up out of an inn, 
out of the dirt of the meanest drudgery, out of pov- 
erty and hunger and frost ; out of the awful loneliness 
of friendlessness, and the agony of insult and ridicule, 
until inspired and redeemed by the tenderness of John 
Wesley's words, and the touch of his friendly hand, 
he became an evangelist such as the world has never 
known since Peter the Fisherman sat under the flam- 
ing tongues of the first Pentecost ! Whitefield's words 
were pictures illumined. Men listening saw the 
scenes he painted. They heard lullabies, sweet and 
low, crooned by the rippling waters of Galilee. They 
stood, trembling and affrighted, as the wind, with 
sepulchral voice, moaned among the olive trees ; and 
their faces blanched to the whiteness of death, as they 
saw the ghostly lips of the moon touch the pale brow 
of the stricken Christ, bowed beneath the awful suf- 
fering of Gethsemane ! Garrick and Hume and Frank- 
lin and Chesterfield were entranced while they lis- 
tened. Strong hard brutal men, bent like reeds, under 
the Cyclopean hammer of his volcanic emotion. A 
ruffian, who had threatened to kill Whitefield, dropped 
the jagged stone from his nerveless hand, and sobbed 
aloud, "I came to break your head, but you have 



236 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

broken my heart." A deaf old woman, who had cursed 
him as he passed up the street, clambered to the pul- 
pit stairs, that she might not lose a syllable of his ser- 
1 mon ; even the children hung on his entrancing words 
-with gleaming, streaming eyes. A child, after hear- 
ing him preach, became ill, and through all the pauses 
of her pain, murmured, "Let me go to Mr. White- 
field's God." 

Lady Lawrence. Her heroic devotion to her husband. 
During the terrible days of suffering which came to 
Sir Henry Lawrence, while laboring for the allevia- 
tion of the condition of the people of India, and while 
the wives of other officers remained in their homes of 
comfort and safety, in London, Lady Lawrence built 
and fed fires to keep off tigers and panthers, that her 
husband might continue unmolested in the arrange- 
ment of his plans for surveying and irrigation. 

Great Men not Wholly Perfect. 

Abraham and David and Moses and Paul were 
marred by many flaws and foibles. Men are never 
perfect or even great save in one or two phases of 
character. Leonidas was perfect in his love of coun- 
try. Aristotle was perfect in his love of justice; Soc- 
' rates in his love of philosophy; and Turner in his 
love of art; but none of these could sit wholly una- 
bashed, had the searchlight of Diogenes been turned 
upon them. There is much beast and some devil in 
all men. Marsden, the missionary, when ill spoken 
of, said to a friend who offered to resent it, "What 
you have heard is not the worst of me ! if I were to 
walk through the streets with my heart laid bare, the 
very children would stone me." If a friend has but 
one eye, we should not look too much upon his blind 
side. Let us seek rather for the best in him, and cher- 
ish and cling to that. "Hast thou observed, Doris," 
said a father to his daughter, "that thy friend William 
Stilling has lame feet?" "Yes," she replied, "I have 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 237 

. seen them. But he speaks so kindly and acts so nobly 
that I seldom look at his feet." "True, Doris," con- 
tinued the father, "but young women generally look at 
a man's figure." "I do, too, father," was her answer, 
"but William Stilling pleases me just as he is ; if he 
had straight feet, he would not be William Stilling." 

Anna Scott Drysdale. An illustration of what a 
wife ought to be. 
Anna Scott Drysdale was the wife of Alexander 
Duff, the first Scotch missionary to India. In mind 
and heart and disposition, she was congenial to her 
husband. She was willing to forsake father and 
mother and home, and best of all herself, for him and 
his work. She brought to the altar of love, friendship's 
gifts of sympathy, confidence, integrity, and sacrifice 
and throughout a long life of arduous toil, and unsel- 
fish service, ever remained his inspiration, and his sal- 
vation. Alexander Duff could not have reached the 
high place of his fair and sweet renown, but for noble, 
beautiful Anna Scott Drysdale. 

Eloquence of Edmund Burke. 

When the people heard Edmund Burke, at the trial 
of Warren Hastings, they said at the conclusion of the 
first hour, "This is mere declamation;" at the end of 
the second hour they said, "This is a wonderful ora- 
tion;" at the close of the third, "Mr. Hastings has 
acted very unjustifiably;" at the fourth, "Mr. Hastings 
is an atrocious criminal ;" and at the last — the expira- 
tion of four days — "Of all monsters of iniquity, the 
most enormous is Warren Hastings !" The effect was 
such that Mr. Pitt found it necessary to move an ad- 
journment, that the house might recover from the 
overpowering effect of Burke's extraordinary elo- 
quence. 

The Oratory of Edward Everett. 

Edward Everett, that prince of conservatism, that 



238 BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. 

lord of the artistic and fit, failed to reach the Olym- 
pian heights of eloquent greatness. He was too anx- 
ious to be right. He was an apologetic trimmer. His 
desire to be right, was a desire to be right with the 
majority; he wished to please the larger number. 
True, he walked in the quiet valleys of speech, and by 
the sweetly murmuring brooks of musical rhetoric ; he 
gathered all the flowers of language, and weaving 
them into garlands of harmonious color, hung them 
about the neck of his utterance. Men admired, but 
were not moved, not convinced by him. He knew not 
the avalanche, the torrent. He could pipe melodiously, 
but he could not thunder. His silvery veins of reflec- 
tion were dug with a golden spade, but the grinding 
of the "mills of the gods" were to him an unknown 
quantity. He was an oratorical dandy; a drawing- 
room declaimer, and his attitudes and gestures sug- 
gested the looking-glass, so that in spite of an impres- 
sive presence, he failed to impress. His oration on 
"Washington" was the highest possible exhibition of 
the evolution of the school-boy declamation — it did 
not build the monument to Washington — the cause, 
and not the declaimer, built it. Love of the Father of 
his Country, in the hearts of the people was the mo- 
tive power which opened purses. Had the subject 
been a eulogy of John Smith, it would not have 
touched one generous heart, but with Henry Clay as 
the orator, that first of American orators, the people 
would have said "We do not know John Smith, but 
here is our money." Lacking dramatic genius, Ev- 
erett's attempts at the dramatic were ridiculous. At 
an agricultural fair, after having dwelt glowingly 
upon a product of New England, brighter and better 
than California gold, he drew from his pocket, an ear 
of corn. At another time, to illustrate the effect of 
sunlight upon dew-drops, he dipped his finger in a 
tumbler of water, and allowed the drops to trickle 



BEACON RIGHTS OF MEN AND WOMEN. .239 

from the end, as he held it up in the flare of the gas 
light. 

Diogenes and Alexander the Great. 

Once in the city of Corinth, Diogenes attracted the 
attention of that military conqueror of the world, Al- 
exander the Great. Said the conqueror, "I am Alex- 
ander the Great." Said the little yellow Diogenes, "I 
am Diogenes the cynic." "What can I do to serve 
you?" continued the conqueror. The cynic replied, 
"Stand out of the sunshine." 

Huxley the Naturalist. 

The greatness of Huxley, for whom the sea and 
earth and sky gave up their secrets, is shown not so 
much in his herculean labors in comparative anatomy, 
as in these words of gold : "I protest that if some great 
power would agree to make me always think that 
which is true, and do that which is right, on condition 
of being turned into a clock, and wound up every 
morning, I should instantly close with the offer!" 

Abraham Lincoln and Liberty. 

Freedom stood erect, and reached so high, it kissed 
the lips of God, when Lincoln said, "This is a coun- 
try where every man has a right to be equal with every 
other man." 



NOT VERY FAR AWAY. 



"The Kingdom of Heaven is Within You." 



IT HERB'S a beautiful land they say, 
iF[ By prophet and minstrel foretold, 
> Where the light of an endless day 
Falls soft o'er the hills of gold; 
No shadow e'er clouds the sky above, 

'Tis Fair as sunny May; 
No sad leaves fall, no roses die, 
Sweet blossoms star the way, 
And the hours go blithely by — 
But it's ever so far away. 

There's a happier land, we're told, 

Far off down the river of years, 
And the dwellers there never grow old, 

They know neither sorrow nor tears; 
No shadow e'er clouds the sky above, 

'Tis fair as sunny May; 
No storm shall come, no night shall hide 

The smiling face of day; 
There are songs in the valleys wide — 

But it's ever so far away. 

There's a beautiful land I know, 

But not down the river of Time, 
"Where the sweetest of roses grow 

And bells have a golden chime; 
No shadow e'er clouds the sky above, 

'Tis fair as sunny May; 
Its sun is Truth, its star is Love, 

Hope's blossoms strew the way, 
And Faith is its singing dove — 

And it's not very far away. 



JUN 12 1901 



